The killers of the novel and the series surely fascinate and terrify the immediate European and American audiences .
The novel tells the story of John Luther ’ s attempts to bring to justice a “ monster ” whose kidnappings and brutal murders reveal a propensity for evil equivalent to those committed by any creature from the archives of Gothic horror . In the novel , Luther uses the information provided by the London police department ’ s computer base to track down Henry Madsen , a wolfish predator who has ties to a baby-smuggling ring out of Eastern Europe . Madsen has recently murdered Tom and Sarah Lambert , an attractive middle-class couple , and ripped from Sarah ’ s womb the fetus that she has been carrying for several months . Luther ’ s description of the murder seems intended to elicit the horror that one feels upon learning of similar real-life atrocities : “ Whoever did this , they let themselves into the house while Tom and Sarah were sleeping . They cut off Tom ’ s genitals and choked him with them . They cut open Sarah ’ s belly and they took the baby ” ( Cross 26 ). While Luther and his assistants do discover the identity of the killer , they cannot prevent the death of the fetus , to whom Madsen has given the name Ellen , nor can they act quickly enough to prevent Madsen and his step-son from butchering most of the Daltons , another attractive , well-to-do English family , in order to kidnap nine-year old daughter Mia , whom Madsen plans to use for reproductive purposes . In the novel ’ s final scene , repeated in the first TV episode , Luther corners Madsen in an abandoned industrial park warehouse . As Madsen charges Luther , the floor caves in , and the killer finds himself dangling by his fingers from a section of board with a long drop below . Enraged by this killer ’ s monstrous deeds , Luther gives into his own usually repressed dark impulses and steps on Madsen ’ s fingers to ensure that this creature falls to his death . Having acted against his conviction that all human life is worth saving , Luther suffers a minor breakdown and takes a leave of absence from the London Police Department .
Settings , Hauntings , and Scary Sounds
The London of the Luther novel and TV series becomes a microcosm of the cities and towns that constitute the settings for the recent European crime dramas that depend for their effectiveness upon elements from traditional Gothic horror . Indeed , the London of John Luther proves to be as hostile a setting as most any conceived by writers of who have worked within this subgenre . In both the novel and the TV episodes , the gloomy landscapes of Anne Radcliffe and Edgar Allan Poe give way to “ derelict London ” ( Tailing ), a collection of darkened and dilapidated buildings that serve as counterparts to the ruins found of more traditional Gothic narratives ( Stevens 54 ) and that , in
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