Expert on body language and memory, and consultant to the Oslo Police, psychologist Kari Voss sleepwalks through her days, and, by night, continues the devastating search for her young son, who disappeared on his birthday, seven years earlier.
Still grieving for her dead husband, and trying to pull together the pieces of her life, she is thrust into a shocking local investigation, when two teenage girls are violently murdered in a family summer home in the nearby village of Son.
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When a friend of the victims is charged with the barbaric killings, it seems the case is closed, but Kari is not convinced. Using her skills and working on instinct, she conducts her own enquiries, leading her to multiple suspects, including people who knew the dead girls well…
With the help of Chief Constable Ramona Norum, she discovers that no one – including the victims – are what they seem. And that there is a dark secret at the heart of Son village that could have implications not just for her own son’s disappearance, but Kari’s own life, too…
My Review
I’m just gobsmacked! This is SO good. Typical Scandi/Nordic Noir, it’s hard-hitting, gritty and quite graphic. More than ‘quite’ actually. I’m sticking my neck out here, but it’s probably one of the best crime novels I’ve read in years.
Kari Voss, psychologist and expert on body language and memory, lost her son when he disappeared on his ninth birthday seven years ago. No trace of him has ever been found. She also lost her beloved husband a few years earlier. She is alone, with only her work to keep her going and the hope that her son is still out there somewhere – alive. She barely sleeps.
Then her friend Chief Constable Ramona Norum, asks for her help with a new case. Two 16-year-old girls have been brutally murdered the night before Halloween, and they just happened to be in the same school year as Kari’s son. In fact they were friends. Could that be a coincidence?
But nothing is as it seems, and even though someone has confessed to the killings, Kari can’t be sure. Too many stones left unturned. Too many possible suspects. And too many secrets in the village of Son.
You’ll have to work a bit if you want to discover the truth for yourself. I didn’t guess the killer, I was sure towards the end that it was someone else. But there’s another plot twist that is far more devastating. Now I was truly gobsmacked.
It’s absolutely brilliant, but then it would be with two such esteemed authors as Johana Gustawsson and Thomas Enger collaborating.
Many thanks to @annecater for inviting me to be part of #RandomThingsTours
About the Authors
Known as the Queen of French Noir, Johana Gustawsson is one of France’s most highly
regarded, award-winning crime writers, recipient of the prestigious Cultura Ligue de
l`Imaginaire Award for her Gothic mystery Yule Island. Number-one bestselling books
include Block 46, Keeper, Blood Song and her historical thriller, The Bleeding. Johana lives in Sweden with her family.
A former journalist, Thomas Enger is the number-one bestselling author of the Henning Juul series and, with co-author Jørn Lier Horst, the international bestselling Blix & Ramm series, and one of the biggest proponents of the Nordic Noir genre. He lives in Oslo.
Rights to Johana and Thomas’ books have been sold to a combined fifty countries and, for the first time, two crime writers, from two different countries, writing in two different languages, have joined forces to create an original series together.
About Orenda Books
Orenda Books is a small independent publishing company specialising in literary fiction with a heavy emphasis on crime/thrillers, and approximately half the list in translation. They’ve been twice shortlisted for the Nick Robinson Best Newcomer Award at the IPG awards, and publisher and owner Karen Sullivan was a Bookseller Rising Star in 2016. In 2018, they were awarded a prestigious Creative Europe grant for their translated books programme. Three authors, including Agnes Ravatn, Matt Wesolowski and Amanda Jennings have been WHSmith Fresh Talent picks, and Ravatn’s The Bird Tribunal was shortlisted for the Dublin Literary Award, won an English PEN Translation Award, and adapted for BBC Radio Four ’s Book at Bedtime. Six titles have been short- or long-listed for the CWA Daggers. Launched in 2014 with a mission to bring more international literature to the UK market, Orenda Books publishes a host of debuts, many of which have gone on to sell millions worldwide, and looks for fresh, exciting new voices that push the genre in new directions. Bestselling authors include Ragnar Jonasson, Antti Tuomainen, Gunnar Staalesen, Michael J. Malone, Kjell Ola Dahl, Louise Beech, Johana Gustawsson, Lilja Sigurðardóttir and Sarah Stovell.
