Darkly Dreaming Dexter

Darkly Dreaming Dexter

Cover of the 2004 edition
Author	Jeff Lindsay
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Crime novel
Publication date	July 2004
Media type	Print (hardback & paperback)
Followed by	Dearly Devoted Dexter

Darkly Dreaming Dexter is a 2004 novel by Jeff Lindsay, the first in his series about serial killer Dexter Morgan. It formed the basis of the Showtime television series Dexter and won the 2005 Dilys Award and the 2007 Book to TV award.

The novel's protagonist, Dexter Morgan, works for the Miami-Dade Police Department as a forensic blood spatter pattern analyst. In his spare time, Dexter is a serial killer who kills murderers, rapists, and other undesirables he believes have escaped, are escaping, or will ultimately escape justice.

Dexter's murders are directed by an inner voice he refers to as the "Dark Passenger", which keeps prodding Dexter to satisfy his homicidal urges on a regular basis. Once he has done so, the voice is placated for a while, but it always eventually comes back.

Flashbacks reveal that his foster father, a police detective named Harry Morgan, recognized early on that Dexter was a violent sociopath with an innate need to kill, and taught him how to kill people who had gotten away with murder as a way to channel his homicidal urges in a "positive" direction. Harry also taught the boy to be a careful and meticulous killer, to leave no clues, and to be absolutely sure his victims were guilty before killing them. Dexter calls these rules "the Code of Harry."

Dexter manages his double life reasonably well for years, but his idyll is disturbed when he becomes involved in the investigation of a series of killings of prostitutes. The "Tamiami Slasher" has committed at least three murders already, as the novel opens. Dexter's sister, Deborah, wants out of Vice and into Homicide, and, knowing that her brother has eerie "hunches", asks him for help in solving the case.