Favourite Discoveries of 2016 (5)

Here is Michelle Peckham's favourite crime discovery of 2016:

Michelle's Favourite Discoveries of 2016

Fortunately, while in the US in the summer, I was able to access many TV productions of books by my favourite Scandi authors, including those based on Liza Marklund's Annika Bengtzon series. I watched all the episodes, and they were excellent. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to be available in the UK, but hopefully will be at some point.

I also discovered the two films of the first two Jussi Adler-Olsen Department Q series (The Keeper of Lost Causes, and The Absent One). Both were excellent, and highly recommended.

TV & Radio News: Keeper of Lost Causes, Sleuths, Spies & Sorcerers, Body Count Rising, Foreign Bodies

The film based on Jussi Adler-Olsen's The Keeper of Lost Causes (UK: Mercy) is showing on BBC Four on Saturday (15th) at 9pm.

More details on the BBC Website.

Read Maxine's review of the book, Mercy, translated by Lisa Hartford.

Also of interest next week on BBC Four, is Andrew Marr's Sleuths, Spies & Sorcerers which begins on Monday (17th), at 9pm. The first episode deals with detective fiction:

In the first episode of a series that explores the books we (really) read, Andrew Marr investigates the curious case of detective fiction. This is a genre that been producing best-sellers since the 19th century, and whose most famous heroes - Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot, Inspector Rebus - are now embedded in our collective psyche. But how does detective fiction work- and how do the best crime writers keep us compulsively turning the pages? 

Andrew deconstructs detective stories by looking at their 'rules' - the conventions we expect to be present when we pick up a typical mystery. Because detective fiction is an interactive puzzle, these rules are the rules of a game - a fiendish battle of wits between the reader and the writer. What is remarkable is that instead of restricting novelists (as you might expect), these rules stimulate creativity, and Andrew reveals how clever writers like Agatha Christie have used them to create a seemingly infinite number of story-telling possibilities.

The fictional detective is a brilliant invention, a figure who takes us to (often dark) places that we wouldn't normally visit. While we are in their company, no section of society is off-limits or above suspicion, and Andrew shows how writers have used crime fiction not merely to entertain, but also to anatomise society's problems. 

Andrew interviews modern-day crime writers including Ian Rankin, Sophie Hannah and Val McDermid, while profiling important pioneers such as Agatha Christie, Dashiell Hammett and Ruth Rendell. Along the way, he decodes various great set-pieces of the detective novel such as Hercule Poirot's drawing room denouements, and the 'locked room' mysteries of John Dickson Carr.

On Radio 4, listen online or download via iPlayer - Body Count Rising:

Killer brandishes knife....squeezes hands tightly around woman's throat....drags body through woods. This could describe any number of prime-time dramas on British TV.

There are numerous dramas with similar recurring narratives - a little girl abducted and murdered, a teenage girl raped, a wife beaten. Cue sinister music, graphic images, and sometimes overly-sexy portrayals of female victims. But has television culture made the depiction of rape and the ritualistic murder of women into an undesirable industry?

Audiences lap it up, but what does our fascination with glossy, high budget TV series, saturated with the corpses of unfortunate women, say about the society we live in, and the way we view women?

Actor Doon Mackichan examines the trend, speaking to criminal sociologist Ruth Penfold-Mounce; Variety's TV critic Sonia Saraiya; Allan Cubbit, writer and director of critically-acclaimed series The Fall; playwright Nick Payn; Elaine Collins, Executive Producer of Shetland; and an actor who has twice played a rape victim.

And courtesy of Radio 4 Extra, you can stream episodes of Mark Lawson's Foreign Bodies series from a couple of years ago:

Series 1 - Mark Lawson presents a history of modern Europe through literary detectives.
Series 2 - Mark Lawson looks at crime fiction as a form for exploring social change around the world.
Series 3 - Mark Lawson examines how mystery novels have reflected five different political systems.

Review Roundup: Adler-Olsen, Anderson, Cahoon, Costantini, Cross, Daly, Hiekkapelto, Hjorth & Rosenfeldt, Johnstone, Mina, Sundstol

Here are eleven reviews which have been added to the Euro Crime website today, all have appeared on the blog since last time*.

*I am trialling a new approach at the moment in that all reviews will appear on the Euro Crime blog rather than being separate files as part of the Euro Crime website. I feel this will give the reviews more exposure and make them more findable in a search engine. The reviews will appear daily ie Monday to Friday, with roundups on Sundays. The website will continue with bibliographies etc, the only change is that the reviews will be on the blog.

I'd be interested in any comments about this new approach.

You can keep up to date with Euro Crime by following the blog and/or liking the Euro Crime Facebook page and follow on Twitter, @eurocrime.

New Reviews

Michelle Peckham reviews Jussi Adler-Olsen's Buried tr. Martin Aitken, the fifth in the Carl Morck and Assad series set in Copenhagen;

Amanda Gillies reviews Lin Anderson's The Special Dead, the eleventh in the Rhona Macleod series (check back on Tuesday for a Q & A with Lin);

Not Euro Crime, but as part of an occasional special feature, I review Lynn Cahoon's Guidebook to Murder, the first in a series set in a coastal Californian town;


Lynn Harvey reviews Roberto Costantini's The Root of all Evil tr. N S Thompson, the middle part of a projected trilogy;




Also set in America is Scottish author Mason Cross's The Samaritan, reviewed by Terry Halligan;

Terry also reviews Bill Daly's Double Mortice the second in the DCI Charlie Anderson series set in Glasgow;

Ewa Sherman reviews Kati Hiekkapelto's The Hummingbird tr. David Hackston which introduces Finland's Detective Anna Fekete;


Geoff Jones reviews Hjorth & Rosenfeldt's The Man Who Watched Women tr. Marlaine Delargy, the second in the Sebastian Bergman series;

Amanda also reviews The Jump by Doug Johnstone, and concludes "I am lost for superlatives to describe this book";

Michelle also reviews Denise Mina's Blood Salt Water, the fifth in the DS Alex Morrow series

and Laura Root reviews Vidar Sundstol's The Ravens tr. Tiina Nunnally, the conclusion to his Minnesota Trilogy.

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

Review: Buried by Jussi Adler-Olsen tr. Martin Aitken

Buried by Jussi Adler-Olsen tr. Martin Aitken, February 2015, 592 pages, Penguin, ISBN: 1405909803

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

The long pre-amble to this book, builds up the background to the eventual crimes that Department Q is tasked with investigating. As part of a money laundering swindle, René Eriksen, a government official, is sending money to Africa, to help his friend Teis Snap, the head of Karrebæk Bank to prevent the bank from going under. Somehow, this is linked, at least in part with the local work of Louis Fon, who was working with the Baka pygmy tribe to protect their way of life in the Bantu region in Africa, but he is brutally murdered by Mbomo when he discovers that the money that should have been used to help them was actually being used to buy alcohol and drugs. As he lies dying, he manages to send a cryptic text from his mobile phone, which is received by William Stark, who works for René. William is sent out to investigate Fon’s disappearance, but while there, helped by Swedish man in a bar, he manages to decipher the text, which hints at the scandal. Stark immediately and unexpectedly returns to Denmark, but this was a dangerous move, and he hasn’t banked on the ruthlessness of Teis Snap, who engineers William’s disappearance.

Marco is a young, bright lad, who in a rather Dickensian way, works in a gang of children made up of pick-pocketers and beggars, which is controlled by his uncle Zola. He’s never been allowed to go to school, and the gang have travelled around Europe before ending up in Denmark, but he’s managed to teach himself quite a bit by reading books, and is one of the few in the gang that has managed to learn to speak Danish fairly well. Zola is a bully, and beats the children who don’t perform well on the streets. One night Marco overhears Zola planning to maim him, so that he can be an effective beggar and he decides to try to escape. And in doing so, he stumbles across Stark’s body.

Department Q, is made up of DI Carl Mørck, a Muslim sidekick called Assad, and they are supported by Rose, a strong, opinionated and difficult woman who nevertheless is extremely good at her job. Mørck is divorced from his wife Vigga, dating his psychologist Mona, and living in his house is Hardy, an ex-cop who is now a paraplegic, a lodger called Morten and his boyfriend Mika, and his difficult teenage son Jesper. Department Q is tasked with tackling unsolved cases, and eventually they almost stumble onto the case of the missing William Stark. Then, the plot follows the parallel stories of Marco, trying to keep hidden from Zola and his gang, as well as the police, with his knowledge of the fate of Stark that will eventually become important, alongside the investigations of Department Q.

The sarcasm, back-biting and apparent dysfunctionality of all three members of Department Q make for entertaining reading, though in reality they make a very good team, with complementary strengths that work well together to solve the crimes under investigation. And the desperate plight of Marco, and how he seems to have as many lives as a cat, as he escapes capture and harm, time and time again through his wits and intelligence, is well told and engaging. The Department Q stories are complex, well written, and never fail to disappoint, and this one is no exception. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and if you haven’t read these novels yet, it’s about time you did!

Michelle Peckham, August 2015

Film News: From Borch to Mørck

The Killing III's Nikolaj Lie Kaas who played Mathias Borch is to star as Carl Mørck in four films based on Jussi Adler-Olsen's Department Q series. Lebanese-Swedish actor Fares Fares will play Assad.

The first film, The Keeper of Lost Causes, [loosely?], based on the first book (published as Mercy in the UK) will be released in Denmark on the 3 October and has been snapped up for the UK by Arrow Films.

From Trust Nordisk:

Based on the first book in Jussi Adler-Olsen’s bestselling thriller series about Department Q THE KEEPER OF LOST CAUSES tells the story of the two policemen Carl Mørck and Assad who become involved in a five-year-old case concerning a missing woman, Merete. Soon Carl and Assad are on a journey through Scandinavia’s darkest corners to find a psychopathic killer.

Mercy, translated by Lisa Hartford, was voted the Euro Crime Reviewers Favourite read of 2011.

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.

Review: Disgrace by Jussi Adler-Olsen

Disgrace by Jussi Adler-Olsen translated by K E Semmel, June 2012, 215 pages, Penguin, ISBN: 0141399988

DISGRACE is the eagerly awaited sequel to the popular MERCY, the debut of Jussi Adler-Olsen; both are set in Copenhagen. MERCY introduced Detective Superintendent Carl Morck who is assigned to work cold cases in Department Q. His only colleague is a civilian, the mysterious Assad. They are joined in DISGRACE by a forthright police secretary, Rose.

Someone wants Carl and co to reopen a case that's been solved. The investigation into the brutal murder of a brother and sister was closed nine years later when the murderer confessed however someone thinks that that's not the whole story. They link those deaths to a number of other assaults and disappearances and believe the culprits to be a group of now prominent businessmen.

Alongside the Department Q investigation are chapters from the point of view of Kimmie who has been on the streets in hiding from the same businessmen and chapters from the businessmen themselves. Eventually all three narratives coincide in a dangerous situation.

After the success of MERCY it would be hard for DISGRACE to reach the same height and unfortunately for me it didn't. There are plenty of things to like still, the humour, the conversations between the three disparate members of Department Q and Carl's attempts to woo his psychologist, and a solid police investigation. On the negative side are the bits which don't involve Carl. The people Carl is chasing and their activities are so unpleasant – both animal and human cruelty abound - that I found their, at times quite lengthy, sections hard going. Whereas MERCY's second narrative strand came from the strong and sympathetic victim of Merete, DISGRACE has Kimmie who is also strong, but unlikeable and unbalanced and though there is an attempt to explain her abnormal and violent behaviours by a terrible childhood it's hard to feel anything for her plight. For me this was at times a difficult read but those less squeamish than I, may get more out of it.

I'd also recommend reading MERCY beforehand to get up to speed with Carl's work and personal situation.

Translation News

I've been told that the follow-up to Jussi Adler-Olsen's Mercy - Disgrace - is being pushed back to June (from March). Proofs should be around in a couple of months. No news on the translator yet. If this happens Disgrace will be eligible for the 2013 International Dagger not the 2012.

The sequel to Lars Kepler's The Hypnotist, The Nightmare (out May 2012), is being translated by Laura A Wideburg. She has previously translated the three Inger Frimansson books available in English and reviewer Maxine, at the time, praised her translations. Laura Wideburg's website also states that she is working on a Helene Tursten novel (presumably 2012's Night Rounds?)

New Reviews: Adler-Olsen, Kepler, Krajewski, Lackberg, Lewis, Marks

New competition for May:
Win a copy of Stagestruck by Peter Lovesey UK & Europe only

I've added a few more reviews of those titles eligible for the 2011 CWA International Dagger, a topic which I'll be revisiting on the blog before the announcement of the shortlist on Friday, so do check back.

(I'll be at CrimeFest next weekend so there won't be any new reviews next Sunday.)

Here are this week's reviews:

Maxine Clarke reviews Mercy by Jussi Adler-Olsen, tr. Lisa Hartford, the first in the Department Q series;

Lizzie Hayes reviews Lars Kepler's debut The Hypnotist, tr. Ann Long;

I review Marek Krajewski's somewhat seedy but compulsive Phantoms of Breslau, tr. Danusia Stok which though it is the third in the series is set before the previous two;

Maxine also reviews the fourth in the Erica Falck/Patrik Hedstrom series, The Gallows Bird by Camilla Lackberg, tr. Steven T Murray;

Susan White reviews Jonathan Lewis's debut, Into the Darkness

and Geoff Jones reviews Howard Marks's Sympathy for the Devil.

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