Day Of The Dead by Nicci French

For ten years, psychologist Frieda Klein has been in the shadow of a psychopath, Dean Reeve.   She originally was treating his twin brother for depression.  Dean killed him and began to impersonate him.  Frieda was the only person who recognized what was happening.  Since then, Dean has indiscriminately killed and killed again, anyone who got in his way or just random people if he wanted to leave a message.  But one message is clear; he is obsessed with Frieda and will kill anyone he thinks is bothering her or too close to her.  Perhaps he wants to kill her himself.

Lola is a young college student, spending her days larking about with her friends and attending classes.  When she needs a topic for her dissertation, she is steered onto the topic of Frieda by one of the lecturers in her college, a man who dislikes Frieda as she has shown his analysis of cases to be wrong several times.  Lola tries to contact Frieda but has little success so she starts to contact Frieda's friends and people she has worked with in the past.  Frieda is apparently in hiding, gone to be out of Reeve's sight and hopefully obsession.

As Lola wanders around trying to contact Frieda, she instead runs into Reeve.  When she does finally meet Frieda, Frieda sees a picture of Dean on Lola's phone and she knows Lola's life as she knows it is done.  She hustles Lola to her apartment and gives her ten minutes to grab anything she wants.  She throws away Lola's phone and cuts off her Internet access.  Lola and Frieda are on the run, moving from place to place one short step ahead of Reeve.  Frieda feels that things are coming to a head and soon either she or Reeve will be gone.  Which will it be?

The Frieda Klein series is one of the top series in the mystery genre.  Readers have followed Frieda for years, getting to know her and intimately feeling what being the focus of a psychopath would be like.  They have grieved with Frieda over the deaths Reeve creates and cheered as she solved mysteries sometimes with and sometimes without the police.  They have been consoled as Frieda pulls together a group of family and friends to sustain her.  Above all, they have worried about her as Dean's focus on her gets deadlier through the years.  The ending of this series is sad but gives resolution and this novel is recommended for readers of mystery.