MostlyFiction Book Reviews » Swedish Crime Writer We Love to Read! Wed, 14 May 2014 13:06:32 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=4.3 ITALIAN SHOES by Henning Mankell /2011/italian-shoes-by-henning-mankell/ /2011/italian-shoes-by-henning-mankell/#comments Sun, 31 Jul 2011 12:36:18 +0000 /?p=19569 Book Quote:

“A naked man in the freezing cold, with an axe in his hand, opening up a hole in the ice? I suppose, really, that I hope there will be someone out there one of these days, a black shadow against all the white — somebody who sees me and wonders if he’d be able to stop me before it was too late.”

Book Review:

Review by Roger Brunyate  (JUL 31, 2011)

This is a compact sonata of a novel, composed in four “movements.” The title of the last, “Winter Solstice,” might have been a better title for the whole book, set mainly on a small frozen island off the coast of Sweden. It is certainly an appropriate image: the solstice is the darkest part of the year; after it, the days will get longer, but it will still be winter for a long time. This is a book about resurrection, thaw, the slow flowering of the frozen spirit, but it promises few miracles, and even at the end there are setbacks and reversals — a feeling Nordic people must know well in their long wait for Spring.

Fredrik Welin lives alone on his rocky Baltic island, in a decaying house with an anthill slowly engulfing the table in the living room, breaking the ice on the sea each morning for the chilling plunge that is his principal means of assuring himself that he is still alive. He is not a good person, as other characters in the book will tell him; he is too ready to shrug off his responsibilities. As a young man, he abandoned a woman who loved him. Later, at the height of his career as a surgeon, he abandoned medicine after one horrible mistake. Now in his sixties, he has essentially abandoned life. His only contact with the outside world is the irritating mailman; “it’s not easy when your closest friend is somebody you dislike.”

Then one day he sees a figure on the snow outside his door, an old woman with a walker. It is a figure from his past come back to claim him, to demand an accounting for broken promises, implacable as a Fury, yet offering gifts in return: the opportunity once again to care about others, to move beyond his island fastness, to find a family. Rebirth is painful, and the book is full of violence and anger — but also happiness. Twice, the emotions are so strong that Welin flees back to his island. His is by no means a steady progress, more like a game of Chutes and Ladders; there is one especially shocking turnaround just as you think you’re coming into the home stretch. Mankell resolutely avoids easy endings; but the understated ending he does write is quietly moving and absolutely true.

There are several different Henning Mankells. Welin’s imperfections as a family man are an extension of Kurt Wallander of the detective novels, only without the crime. He has used the Baltic archipelago setting before in his WW1 psychodrama Depths, but this novel is modern, and thankfully less psychotic. Less isolated too, but the global politics that have been a concern of several of his later novels, most especially The Man from Beijing, are only a distant aura. But still a perceptible one; two of the women who enter Welin’s life are involved in a world beyond Sweden, mostly combating intolerance and greed. One of the characters has gone on pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela in search of God, but failed to find Him. “When I closed that church door behind me, there was nothing else left. But I realized that this emptiness was a sort of consolation in itself.” Mankell works with emptiness, turning it from negative space into a positive one, even a sacred space in a secular world. Long before Christianity, the Winter Solstice has always been associated with religious rites, a magic too mysterious for mere words.

And the title Mankell did choose? A small detail merely, a pair of handcrafted Italian Shoes, made over a period of months by an old Italian craftsman living in retirement in the Swedish forest. A sacrament also, they are a small example of the search for perfection, and a reminder of love where other loves have failed.

AMAZON READER RATING: stars-4-5from 35 readers
PUBLISHER: Vintage; Reprint edition (October 19, 2010)
REVIEWER: Roger Brunyate
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK? YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE: Henning Mankell
EXTRAS: Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION: Read our review of:

Bibliography:

Kurt Wallander Series:

Stand alone novels:

Teen Read:

Movies from books:

]]> /2011/italian-shoes-by-henning-mankell/feed/ 0 THE SHADOW WOMAN by Ake Edwardson /2010/the-shadow-woman-by-ake-edwardson/ /2010/the-shadow-woman-by-ake-edwardson/#comments Sun, 28 Nov 2010 02:50:27 +0000 /?p=13803 Book Quote:

“Crime is an army. He was a policeman but he wasn’t cynical. He believed in the power of good, and that was why he spoke about evil. It was impenetrable, like observing the enemy through bulletproof glass. Anyone who tried to comprehend it with reason went under. He was starting to realize this, but he still had the urge to get in close to defeat that monster. If you couldn’t use your goodness and intellect to confront evil close up, what were you supposed to use? The thought had flashed through his mind before – a thought that was like a black hole right in the middle of reality, terrifying: that evil could be fought only in kind.”

Book Review:

Review by Lynn Harnett  (NOV 27, 2010)

Sweden’s youngest ever chief inspector, at thirty-seven years old, cuts his vacation short when one of his team – a black, Swedish-born woman – has her jaw broken at the annual Gothenburg party, an outdoor late-summer festival at which nativist thugs get drunk and run amok, often in motorcycle gangs.

Gothenburg is sweltering in an August heat wave and Winter shows up for work in cut-offs, a rock band tee shirt and uncut hair – quite a contrast to his usual designer suits and perfect grooming. The attack on his officer has provoked an unaccustomed rage and he unleashes it on his ex-brother-in-law, a criminal with racist ties. “Winter opened his eyes again and looked at his hands. Were they his? It had felt good clenching his fingers around Vennerhag’s jaw.”

It doesn’t take long to round up the attackers, but a murdered woman found in a lakeside ditch effectively ends Winter’s vacation. She has no id or identifying marks; her fingerprints aren’t in any database and no one has reported her missing, though the autopsy shows she’s had a child.

Winter, who finds himself musing on the nature of evil and the urge to fight violence with violence, sets his team in motion, chasing down every lead they can think of, no matter how thin:

“An investigation is a great big vacuum cleaner that sucks in everything: witness statements and forensic evidence, sound ideas and crazy hunches, most of it completely irrelevant to the case. Eventually you find things that fit together. Then you can formulate a hypothesis.”

It takes almost half the book to trace the woman’s identity. Meanwhile the narrative breaks for interludes with a child held captive and missing her mother and a lonely old lady growing anxious about her missing neighbors.

A police procedural with a strong psychological bent, Edwardson’s series stays primarily on Winter, while branching out to include details of his team’s private lives and aspirations. Winter himself is on the brink of a life choice, spurred by his girlfriend Angela’s ultimatum.

The prose is Scandinavian spare with a vivid sense of place only occasionally confusing to an American audience. Fans of Scandinavian crime fiction will love Edwardson. (Translated by Per Carlsson)

AMAZON READER RATING: stars-4-0from 21 readers
PUBLISHER: Penguin (Non-Classics); Reprint edition (September 28, 2010)
REVIEWER: Lynn Harnett
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK? YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:
EXTRAS: An Interview with Ake Edwardson
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION: Other Swedish novels:

Partial Bibliography:

Chief Inspector Erik Winter Novels:

]]> /2010/the-shadow-woman-by-ake-edwardson/feed/ 1 THE MAN FROM BEIJING by Henning Mankell /2010/man-from-the-beijing-by-henning-mankell/ /2010/man-from-the-beijing-by-henning-mankell/#comments Wed, 17 Feb 2010 03:38:15 +0000 /?p=7850 Book Quote:

“I understand that this letter will wreak havoc with your investigation. But what we are all searching for, of course, is clarity. I hope that what I have written can contribute to that…. The day we stop searching for the truth, which is never objective but under the best circumstances built on facts, is the day on which our system of justice collapses completely.”

Book Review:

Review by Eleanor Bukowsky (FEB 16, 2010)

Henning Mankell’s The Man from Beijing, ably translated by Laurie Thompson, opens in January 2006. It is eerily quiet in the northern Swedish hamlet of Hesjövallen. No smoke rises from the chimneys and not a soul stirs. A photographer studying deserted villages in Sweden arrives and knocks on doors, but no one answers. Fearing that something is wrong, he breaks into one of the houses and to his horror, “there was an old woman lying on the kitchen floor. Her head was almost totally severed from her neck. Beside her lay the carcass of a dog, cut in two.” This isolated place will soon make headlines as the scene of a massacre “unprecedented in the annals of Swedish crime.” An unknown assailant used an extremely sharp weapon to torture and cut up his victims.

After Detective Vivian Sundberg and her team survey the carnage, they call for reinforcements, but even experienced law enforcement officials are stymied by the slaughter of nineteen people, most of them elderly. Equally puzzling is the fact that three individuals living in Hesjövallen were left alive. A district judge, fifty-seven year old Birgitta Roslin, has a personal interest in the matter (her mother grew up in Hesjövallen), and we get to know Roslin intimately. She takes her job seriously, suffers from recurrent panic attacks and high-blood pressure, has four grown children whom she sees infrequently, and worries about the future of her passionless marriage. Her fate will be inextricably tied up with the mass murder, which grew out of terrible events whose roots lie in the distant past.

The beginning of the book has an epic sweep and is absolutely mesmerizing. Mankell takes us to China in 1863, where the peasants live in squalor and are oppressed by wealthy and avaricious landowners. The author poignantly recounts the odyssey of three orphaned brothers who travel to Canton to find work. Eventually, they cross the path of predators who transport them in chains to the United States, where they spend many backbreaking hours cleaving mountains and laying rail lines for the transcontinental railroad. Because one of the brothers manages to survive long enough to leave a detailed diary, the tale of his family’s suffering will have grave consequences more than a century later.
Birgitta, whose mother grew up with foster parents in Hesjövallen, uses her sharp judicial mind to form a theory about the killings, based on the fact that a Chinese man was seen in the vicinity of Hesjövallen around the time of the murders. Since the police do not take her ideas seriously, she takes advantage of an opportunity to visit China with an old friend, Karin. There, Birgitta visits the Forbidden City, sees the Great Wall, and reminisces about her younger years as a radical who supported Mao’s ideals of solidarity and liberation. She also tries to learn the identity of the man behind the mass execution in Sweden. Unfortunately, her inquiries place her in danger, since she is being watched by a powerful and psychotic villain who will dispose of her if she gets too close to the truth.

Here, the novel starts to lose steam, as Mankell not only reveals the identity of the killer (a one-dimensional monster), but also introduces too many extraneous characters and subplots. Also irritating is the incredible ineptitude of the Swedish police, who are so clueless that Birgitta has to do their job for them. In addition, the pace of the narrative is slowed by tedious and heavy-handed passages in which various individuals lecture about China’s path to the future. Should this emerging superpower make more of an effort to stay true to its communist roots instead of succumbing to the lures of capitalism? Mankell has combined a crime story with a depiction of a female jurist’s midlife crisis and a polemic about China’s efforts to become a worldwide economic and political force. This is far too much baggage for one work of fiction.

The Man from Beijing might have been more satisfying had the author focused throughout on the massacre and on Birgitta’s efforts to solve the mystery and put her troubled life back together. As it stands, Mankell has written half of a good novel. The second half is a bit dreary and diffuse, and it will take some persistence to stay the course for the entire 366 pages.

AMAZON READER RATING: stars-3-0from 186 readers
PUBLISHER: Knopf (February 16, 2010)
REVIEWER: Eleanor Bukowsky
AVAILABLE AS A KINDLE BOOK? YES! Start Reading Now!
AUTHOR WEBSITE:
EXTRAS: Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION: Read our review of:

Other Swedish crime writers:

Bibliography:

Kurt Wallander Series:

Stand alone novels:

Teen Read:

Movies from books:

]]> /2010/man-from-the-beijing-by-henning-mankell/feed/ 0 THE DARKEST ROOM by Johan Theorin /2009/the-darkest-room-by-johan-theorin/ /2009/the-darkest-room-by-johan-theorin/#comments Sat, 07 Nov 2009 22:18:00 +0000 /?p=6181 Book Quote:

“This is where my book begins, Katrine, the year when the Manor House at Eel Point was built. For me the manor was more than a house where my mother and I lived, it was the place where I became an adult.

Ragnar Davidsson, the eel fisherman, once told me that large parts of the manor were built with salvaged cargo from a German vessel carrying timber. I believe him. On the wall at the far end of the hayloft, the words “in memory of Christian Ludwig” are carved into one of the planks.

I have heard the dead whispering in the walls. They have much to tell.”

Book Review:

Review by Sudheer Apte (NOV 7, 2009)

Off the east coast of Sweden, on the Baltic sea, is the island of Oland, historically populated by fishermen and farmers. Swedish author Johan Theorin knows the area well, and he has used its cold, forbidding terrain as well as rich legends to great effect in both of his mystery novels so far.

The second of these novels, published as “Nattfaak” in Sweden last year, won numerous awards. Its English translation, The Darkest Room, is now available through Random House, and we are lucky to be able to enjoy it.

A young couple, Joakim and Katrine Westin, move from the big city of Stockholm with their two little children to the quiet island. They buy the fictitious Eel Point manor near a pair of lighthouses, and set out to refurbish it. A large, old house with centuries of history, the manor seems to hold stories of lives gone by: we hear some of these as introductory snippets or as interleaved passages with the main narrative. The creaks and groans of the house’s frame in the strong sea winds seem to replay tragedies and menace from decades and centuries ago.

But The Darkest Room is no cheap ghost thriller: far from it. As the couple starts settling in, we learn gradually that Katrine has a strong connection with the manor—her mother Mirja Rambe, a Bohemian single woman, once lived on the property with her own mother, a famous artist. Mirja is full of stories about the manor, but it is not clear how many of them are true. Moreover, we learn later on that the couple’s move to the country was not just a move away from the city life, but in fact had rather traumatic reasons behind it.

The island is not welcoming at all, and in the first few pages, tragedy strikes our young couple, which sends Joakim reeling and unable to sleep. Meanwhile, a gang of three bored young men is loose on the island, doing drugs and breaking into houses to steal things, just as a freshly minted policewoman is posted to keep law and order. The policewoman, Tilda Davidsson, has her hands full fighting for respect from her male chauvinist colleagues, and on the side she is discovering more details about her own connection to the island and the manor, by interviewing her old uncle. When we meet her, she is additionally in the middle of a messy affair of her own.

The novel is exquisitely plotted. Every character, no matter how minor, turns out to be important to the story. And slowly, convincingly, loose strings turn out to lead to knots of deceit, subterfuge, and murder. The crimes are, for the most part, not ordinary ones. Because of the careful order in which Theorin exposes his facts, a rich seam of motives of various people is uncovered, along with themes of grief and loss. The crime story is very logical, and it is enhanced by strong suggestions of the supernatural and by a fantastic sense of place. (Ttanslated by Marlaine Delargy.)

AMAZON READER RATING: stars-4-5from 19 readers
PUBLISHER: Delta (September 29, 2009)
REVIEWER: Sudheer Apte
AMAZON PAGE: The Darkest Room
AUTHOR WEBSITE: Official website for Johan Theorin

Wikipedia page on Johan Theorin
EXTRAS: Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION: Other supernatual mysteries of note:

Isabella Moon by Laura Benedict

A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick

And more set in Sweden:

The Girl in the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

Box 21 by Anders Roslund and Börge Hellström

Bibliography:

]]> /2009/the-darkest-room-by-johan-theorin/feed/ 0 MIND’S EYE by Hakan Nesser /2009/minds-eye-by-hakan-nesser/ /2009/minds-eye-by-hakan-nesser/#comments Sat, 27 Jun 2009 22:08:11 +0000 /?p=2450 Book Quote:

“He still had no idea who he was.

He didn’t think this had happened before.  He had certainly woken up and not known where he was.  Or what day it was.  But his name.. had he ever forgotten his name?

John? Janos?”

 

Book Review:

Reviewed by Eleanor Bukowsky (JUN 27, 2009)

In Håkan Nesser’s Mind’s Eye, a high school teacher named Janek Mitter finds his wife of three months, Eva Maria Ringmar, drowned in their bathtub. When Mitter is accused of murdering her, he has no alibi. He claims that, on the night in question, he was asleep in the next room after drinking too much, and awoke the next morning suffering from a massive hangover. His defense lawyer candidly tells Mitter that his story is unconvincing. However, Detective Chief Inspector Van Veeteren is not completely sold on the husband’s guilt. When a second shocking crime follows on the heels of the first one, Van Veeteren and his team face the daunting task of finding a killer whose boundless rage impels him to commit unspeakable acts.


Mind’s Eye is not a typical murder mystery. Nesser’s biting wit and black humor serve as a sharp counterpoint to an exasperating inquiry that turns out to have many unexpected twists and turns. (In one hilarious scene, a witness that he is interrogating gives Van Veeteren a massage to ease his aching back.) VV, as he is known, is successful at his job because he is an intelligent and forceful leader (although he can be sarcastic, cranky, and patronizing at times), and also because he is curious and capable of making imaginative mental leaps. He doggedly pursues every lead, no matter how tangential. Far from being falsely modest, VV prides himself on “being the best interrogating officer in the district, possibly in the country.” He wastes no effort on political correctness or deferring to his superiors; Van Veeteren is very much his own man.

All of the characters are a bit off-beat. Mitter cracks jokes and refuses to act deferential, even during his trial. Chief Inspector Van Veeteren has a rather unsettled personal life and an obsession with beating his long-suffering colleague, Inspector Munster, at badminton. The introspective Van Veeteren has grown cynical over the years and longs for a life of ease after retirement when he will be able to rid himself of the “feeling of disgust and impotence” that goes with the job. Munster dreads the grueling task of tracking down a suspect. They were “hemmed in by questions and answers and guesses in a slow but inexorable search for the right track.” If they were to make one wrong turn, not only would they be wasting valuable time, but the murderer might conceivably strike again.

Nesser is a fluid writer and Laurie Thompson’s translates expertly from the Swedish. The dialogue is lively and often amusing, and the plot provides enough clues for the armchair detective to take a shot at figuring out whodunit. This police procedural, like so many others, demonstrates why  many homicide investigators become emotionally hardened, are incapable of staying happily married, and develop stomach ulcers. Pursuing murderers is, indeed, “a nasty business,” but Nesser also makes it an entertaining one.

AMAZON READER RATING: stars-4-5from 9 readers
PUBLISHER: Vintage; Reprint edition (June 16, 2009)
REVIEWER: Eleanor Bukowsky
AMAZON PAGE: Mind’s Eye
AUTHOR WEBSITE: Wikipedia page on Håkan NesserOfficial website for Håkan Nesser in Swedish
EXTRAS: Reading Guide and or Excerpt
MORE ON MOSTLYFICTION: Other authors of interest:The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

The Indian Bride by Karin Fossum

Partial Bibliography:

Inspector Van Veeteren Mystery (translated so far):

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