New Reviews: Dunmore, Eriksson, Gibson, Gordon-Smith, Larsson, May, Neville, Simpson, Walker

Here are nine reviews which have been added to the Euro Crime website today, five have appeared on the blog since last time, and four are completely new. Interestingly, the settings of the books reviewed range from Canada to Venezuela.

NB. You can keep up to date with Euro Crime by following the blog and/or liking the Euro Crime Facebook page.

New Reviews

Terry Halligan reviews Helen Dunmore's The Lie writing that "it is not a book that will be forgotten very quickly";

Lynn Harvey reviews Kjell Eriksson's Black Lies, Red Blood tr. Paul Norlen which is the latest in the Ann Lindell series set in Uppsala;

Rich Westwood recommends Jasper Gibson's A Bright Moon for Fools set in an unvarnished Venezuela;

Terry also reviews Dolores Gordon-Smith's latest Jack Haldean mystery, set in the 1920s: After the Exhibition;

Michelle Peckham reviews the newest in Asa Larsson's Rebecka Martinsson series,  The Second Deadly Sin tr. Laurie Thompson, which is set in Northern Sweden;


Michelle also reviews Entry Island by Peter May which is now out in paperback;

Lynn also reviews Stuart Neville's The Final Silence, featuring DI Jack Lennon;


Geoff reviews Ian Simpson's  Murder on the Second Tee, set at St Andrews

and Amanda Gillies reviews Martin Walker's latest "Bruno, Chief of Police" mystery set in France: Children of War.


Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here along with releases by year.

Review: The Second Deadly Sin by Asa Larsson tr. Laurie Thompson

The Second Deadly Sin by Åsa Larsson tr. Laurie Thompson, January 2014, 320 pages, MacLehose Press, ISBN: 0857051725

Reviewed by Michelle Peckham.
(Read more of Michelle's reviews for Euro Crime here.)

Rebecka Martinsson is once again involved in a murder investigation in this latest outing from Åsa Larsson (book five in the series). She was once a hot-shot lawyer in Stockholm, but circumstances in earlier books have brought her back to where she grew up, and she now lives in Kiruna, in the house that was once her grandmother's. She is working as the district prosecutor, and has an impeccable reputation for her preparedness and meticulous attention to detail.

As the story opens, a troublesome bear is shot dead, and is found to have a human hand in his stomach. Next, Rebecka and Eriksson, her police colleague, discover a woman, Sol-Britt, stabbed to death in her house. Outside, her grandson Marcus is found hiding outside in a children’s playhouse, and is clearly traumatised. What has he seen? What does he know? Why was Sol-Britt murdered and what is the connection to the discovery of the hand in the bear’s stomach?

Rebecka should be directing the investigation but a second district prosecutor, Carl Van Post, is nursing a grudge and manages to persuade the chief prosecutor, Björnfot, that he should take charge, leaving Rebecka to conduct her own undercover investigation while 'on holiday' (by her own choice). Police Inspector Anna-Maria Mella, a friend and a colleague, is still involved in the investigation, and keeps Rebecka informed on the quiet. It seems that the murdered woman comes from a family that has suffered a series of tragic events. For example, as well as her own murder, Sol-Britt's son had been killed in a hit and run accident some time earlier. Sadly, as a consequence, Marcus was living with his grandmother Sol-Britt because his mother then refused to look after him.

Interspersed between chapters about the current investigation, is a story set some years before, in 1914, about a school teacher who goes out to Kiruna to run a school, and ends up falling in love with a local entrepreneur. Her story is also a tragic one of unrequited love and its consequences. Gradually, the links between the current investigation and the past events reveal themselves, and Rebecka’s determination and meticulousness enable her to discover the unpleasant truth.

Åsa Larsson's books have a strong feeling of female empowerment, and not just through the strong female leads of Rebecka and Anna-Marie. This book manages to cleverly pass comment on how arrogance, pompousness and at times, weakness in a subset of men can lead to undesirable outcomes (though I should say that most men in the story are depicted in a much more favourable light!). It also shows how strong ties and co-operation between women are important in finding solutions. Rebecka's vulnerability and sense of past, combined with her strong-mindedness determination, thoughtfulness, and ever-developing character is something the reader can empathise and engage with. An interesting plot, combined with intriguing characters, means that all I want now is to read the next outing in the series! And, as always, there is a great translation from Laurie Thompson.

Michelle Peckham, August 2014

New Reviews: Adler-Olsen, Hunter, Kallentoft, Larsson, Sigurdardottir, Sussman, Thomson

Apologies for the slight delay and fewer reviews than usual this week.

Here are 7 new reviews which have been added to the Euro Crime website today:

Last week I reviewed on the blog, Jussi Adler-Olsen's Disgrace tr. K E Semmel the sequel to Mercy;

Rich Westwood reviews Alan Hunter's Gently with the Ladies [the books only sharing a name with the Martin Shaw tv series];

Maxine Clarke reviews Mons Kallentoft's third Malin Fors book, Autumn Killing tr. Neil Smith;

Susan White reviews Asa Larsson's The Black Path tr. Marlaine Delargy now out in paperback;

Amanda Gillies reviews Yrsa Sigurdardottir's standalone ghost-crime thriller I Remember You tr. Philip Roughton;

Lynn Harvey reviews Paul Sussman's third book in his Yusuf Khalifa series, The Labyrinth of Osiris which is the last due to the author's untimely death this year

and Terry Halligan reviews June Thomson's latest collection of Sherlock Holmes stories: The Secret Archives of Sherlock Holmes.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here along with releases by year.

New Reviews: Brookmyre, Drake, Kent, Kernick, Larsson, Rhodes, Siger, Webster, Wilson

There won't be any new reviews next weekend but here are 9 excellent new reviews...

(NB. Don't forget to vote in the International Dagger Polls.)

Rich Westwood reviews Chris Brookmyre's, Where the Bones are Buried, set in Glasgow and now available in paperback;

Amanda Gillies goes back to Ancient Egypt for Nick Drake's third Rahotep mystery, Egypt: The Book of Chaos;

Lynn Harvey travels to the Solomon Islands for G W Kent's One Blood the sequel to Devil-Devil;

Terry Halligan reviews Siege by the UK's equivalent to Harlan Coben: Simon Kernick;

Laura Root reviews the long-awaited UK release of Asa Larsson's The Black Path, tr. Marlaine Delargy (NB. This title precedes Until Thy Wrath Be Past);

Susan White reviews Kate Rhodes's debut Crossbones Yard the first in the Alice Quentin, psychologist series;

Terry also reviews Jeffrey Siger's Target: Tinos the fourth in his Greek series;

Geoff Jones reviews Jason Webster's A Death in Valencia, the sequel to his acclaimed Or the Bull Kills You

and Maxine Clarke reviews the Ellis Peters Historical Dagger 2012 shortlisted A Willing Victim the fourth in Laura Wilson's Ted Stratton series.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive.

Forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here along with releases by year.

CrimeFest - Death in a Cold Climate

Barry Forshaw chairs the Death in a Cold Climate - Scandinavians panel at Crimefest 2012.
Guests: Asa Larsson (Swe), Thomas Enger (Nor), Ragnar Jonasson (Ice) and Gunnar Staalesen (Nor)

Here are my notes:

Stieg Larsson has opened the doors for other Scandinavian authors - light a candle for him - but he is from the north though he writes about Stockholm.

AL is often asked how can such a short person write such horrible things? She kills dogs and priest in her books but only gets letters about the dogs. (NB. No dogs (or priests) are harmed in Until Thy Wrath Be Past). Enjoyed writing her first book the most. Says to know an author, read their first book.

TE: Burned is the first of six books (originally was looking at eight or even twelve) about Henning Juul (sounds like yule), Pierced is out shortly in UK and he is working on Scarred. All six books about Juul finding out why his son died. HJ has "really pissed someone off". There is more information about the fire in Pierced and there is a teaser at the end, as there was at the end of Burned.

GS adapted one of books for theatre so the statue (of Varg Veum in Bergen) is a mixture of that actor and tv actor (though the tv actor is from East Norway and has the wrong accent)

RJ: Crime fiction in Iceland - until Arnaldur Indridason (1997) - was looked down on. There are two murders or less a year in Iceland.

AL comes from town 200km north of polar circle, 100 years old. Asked - why so much mutilations - is it typical for women?

Sjowall and Wahloo are the King and Queen, Henning Mankell is the crown prince, writing in same style.

GS showed Prince Charles and Camilla around Bergen for 27 minutes.

RJ: The plot and setting is the reason for popularity not the social issues, and strong chars (adds AL), especially in a series. And nature (GS) (ie open space, wildlife). If not having to speak in English the four authors could converse in slowly spoken Norwegian.

TE: [Translator] Charlotte Barslund nailed Henning Juul character and GS praising Don Bartlett's translations.

RJ: Started reading Agatha Christie when 12/13 and four years later approached the publisher about translating them.

GS: Writes 5 days a week, loves his job.

AL wrote 'Wrath' between 4-7am, goes to bed early and this is the quiet time when there are no demands from family or telephone. AL was a tax lawyer.

TE: Henning Juul is a real character, these online journalist do exist.

GS: Ambassador for the dark side of Bergen.

AL: No taboos on what to write. TE wouldn't write about paedophilia. RJ: As you write more your boundaries move. GS: not extreme violence, more about psychology.

TE: First draft of Burned was much more humorous but editors stick to conventions and took it out. TE wanted to give H Juul a weapon to deal with his situation.

GS borrows from Raymond Chandler.

Check out the bibliographies and reviews at the Euro Crime website:

Death in a Cold Climate by Barry Forshaw
Asa Larsson
Thomas Enger
Ragnar Jonasson - not yet translated into English
Gunnar Staalesen

Euro Crime Cited on The Black Path

A quote from Maxine's review of Asa Larsson's Until Thy Wrath Be Past has been used on the back of the hardback release of The Black Path which is published 7 June by MacLehose Press.Here are Maxine's reviews of Until Thy Wrath Be Past and The Black Path (US Edition).

New Reviews: Billingham, Burke, Chance, Christie, Larsson, Magson, Rayne, Sharp, Stark & Competition

And the reviews are back! A slightly longer break than I'd anticipated due to family matters but 9 new reviews follow below plus a very short-term competition to win tickets to meet actors from The Killing (Danish version) at The Scandinavia Show next Sunday. I have 4 tickets to giveaway, just enter a few details in this form.

Here are this week's (globe-trotting) reviews:

Geoff Jones reviews the tenth in the Tom Thorne series by Mark Billingham, Good as Dead;

Laura Root reviews Down These Green Streets: Irish Crime Writing in the Twenty-First Century edited by Declan Burke an "anthology of essays and short stories centred on Irish crime writing";

Lynn Harvey reviews Alex Chance's second thriller, now out in mass market paperback Savage Blood which she describes as "Denis Wheatley meets Dan Brown";

I review the audio version of two recently unearthed Hercule Poirot stories by Agatha Christie: The Capture of Cerberus & The Incident of the Dog's Ball which are read by David Suchet;

Maxine Clarke reviews the long-awaited fourth book in translation by Asa Larsson: Until Thy Wrath Be Past, tr. Laurie Thompson which Maxine sums up in one word: "brilliant";

Terry Halligan reviews the second in Adrian Magson's 1960s France-set DI Rocco series, Death on the Rive Nord and he hopes for more in the series;

Amanda Gillies praises highly Sarah Rayne's latest psychological thriller, What Lies Beneath now out in paperback;

The first of two books set in the US written by UK authors is Alex Sharp's Driver: Nemesis, set in New Orleans; it's based on a computer game and written pseudonymously by an "English thriller writer" and reviewed here by Rich Westwood

and the second is Oliver Stark's 88 Killer, his second book set in New York City and which Michelle Peckham found "absorbing".

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive and forthcoming titles can be found by author or date or by category, here.

New Reviews: Cain, Clark, Larsson, Monroe

The following reviews have been added to the review archive over on the main Euro Crime website:

New Reviews:

Paul Blackburn reviews the second in the Accident Man series by Tom Cain - The Survivor (sounds like one for Bond/Bourne fans);

Amanda Brown goes back to the 14th Century in Cassandra Clark's Hangman Blind the first in a new historical crime series;

Maxine Clarke catches up with Swedish lawyer Rebecka Martinsson in Asa Larsson's third book, The Black Path

and Norman Price is very disappointed with Aly Monroe's The Maze of Cadiz.

Previous reviews can be found in the review archive and forthcoming titles can be found here.

Asa Larsson's letter to her readers

The penguin newsletter came a few days ago but I've only just got round to opening it. One of the articles in the Most Wanted section is a 'letter' written by Asa Larsson to her readers, she begins with how she discovered the face of her 'first corpse' and ends with her hopes for The Savage Altar:

I hope you’ll like it. That you’ll like the biting cold of midwinter, the austerity of the people, the dogs that are so important in all my books. I hope you’ll like my police officers: pregnant Anna-Maria with her horse-face, her idle husband whom she loves in spite of everything, and all her children; her colleague Sven-Erik Stålnacke, a man of few words, with his moustache which resembles a squirrel that’s been run over. And I really hope you’ll like my main character, Rebecka Martinsson. I know she’s a little bit isolated from other people and a little bit difficult. The kind of person who works herself to death instead of asking herself how she’s feeling. But she does have her own story, a story she’s running away from. And then of course I hope you’ll like the violence. I have a weakness for shattered bones and bleeding internal organs.

Read the rest of the letter here and two Euro Crime reviews here.

February's first reviews and competitions

Here are this week's new reviews and details of February's competitions:

Latest Reviews:

In Mike Ripley's January crime file, he reviews Death in Hellfire by Deryn Lake, The Templar by Paul Doherty, Death at Dawn by Caro Peacock and The Garden of Evil by David Hewson;

Fiona Walker reviews The Patience of The Spider by Andrea Camilleri which has just been published in the UK;

Maxine Clarke was relieved that Asa Larsson's The Savage Altar (aka Sun Storm) was every bit as good as she'd hoped;

Laura Root enjoyed last month's competition prize - Bad Traffic by Simon Lewis;

Maxine finds Sjowall and Wahloo's third Martin Beck book, The Man on the Balcony to be a "lean and compelling novel"

and I review the first in a new series: Into the Shadows by Shirley Wells - set in a small Lancashire village where the hunts for a domestic murderer and a serial killer collide.


Current Competitions (closing date 29 February):

Win a copy of A Vengeful Longing by R N Morris (no geographical restrictions)

Win a copy of Silent in the Grave by Deanna Raybourn (UK & Europe only)

(geographical restrictions are in brackets)