… Detective Superintendent at the Swedish police’s National Operations Department …
The Hypnotist is book #1. (2009)
This couple are recently the best-selling authors – Swedish or international – in Sweden, across all categories.
I do like the Detective Inspector Joona Linna.
Personally I found this book a bit slow. There is some repetition that could have been avoided.
GET AN EDITOR is what I’m saying.
I have those same complaints with many of the Nordic Noir books—also called Scandinavian crime fiction. It was true of the Dragon Tattoo books. True of Hypnotist.
I’m not a big fan of short stories ➙ BUT this is Deaver, so well worth reading anyway.
“A Textbook Case,” a Lincoln Rhyme story: When a young woman is found brutally murdered in a parking garage, with a veritable mountain of potential evidence to sift through, it may be the most challenging case former NYPD detective Lincoln Rhyme has ever taken on.
“Fast,” a Kathryn Dance story: Kathryn Dance is in a race against the clock to track down the members of a domestic terrorist cell-and the lives of 200 people hang in the balance.
“Game”: After Sarah Lieberman’s new tenants murder her in an attempt to steal her money, Sarah’s housekeeper Carmel is determined to find Sarah’s body so she can lay her soul to rest. But Carmel may discover that the truth is uncomfortably close to home …
“Paradice,” a John Pellam story: When a brake failure leaves him temporarily stranded in a Colorado mountain town, John Pellam finds himself suddenly accused of murder.
Not at all my favourite of the Slough House books.
Still, the humour and banter of Jackson Lamb alone makes it worth reading.
Roderick Ho is entertaining, as well.
One of the regulars is kidnapped. And it all goes wrong after that. 😀
This is the Mick Herron’s third novel in the Slough House series. …
In addition to the inhabitants of Slough House, the main characters are Dame Ingrid Tearney, the head of the service, and Diana – ‘Lady Di’ – Taverner, who wants to be head of the service. The two women clearly loathe each other – a fact that Herron conveys superbly by having them behave towards each other with a studied politeness.
There is somebody else who wants to run the intelligence service – Peter Judd, the Home Secretary, within whose department the intelligence service is included. He wants to control it as part of his career plan to become Prime Minister. There is a deliberate similarity to the popular side of Boris Johnson in his portrayal. …
Suddenly flying to Reykjavík, Iceland for hiking — I bought the new book called Reykjavík.
Icelandic author Ragnar Jónasson is well known. But this book was co-written by the current Prime Minister of Iceland Katrín Jakobsdóttir. Katrín wrote her master’s thesis on the Icelandic crime novel so she’s not simply along for the ride.
Bridget Shaughnessy .. is 16, uneducated, and impoverished when her feckless father dies after a rattlesnake bite on the trail …
Relying on intuition and one remaining mule, Bridget crosses the plains alone and winds up in Dodge City, where her story parts ways with most cowboy novels of the past.
Bridget’s bright red hair attracts the attention of one of the proprietors of the Buffalo Queen Saloon, an establishment devoted to fulfilling the drinking, gambling, and carnal needs of cowboys and others living and passing through the frontier city.
As Bridget embarks on a career as a “sporting woman” in the rough and tumble male world of the emerging West, she receives a belated education not just in the nature of sex work, but also in her own sexuality. …
This pandemic starts in the Scottish Highlands. A pheasant the bird that infects patent zero.
About 80% of the world’s population dies quickly.
Unlike Covid, a high percentage of the survivors have some kinds of magical abilities.
This trilogy is an easy read. I’d call it Young Adult.
Plenty of romance, as expected of Nora Roberts.
Good vs Evil.
The One is a young woman trained for this epic battle. A child born to a special destiny. A teacher who had been waiting over 1000 years for her birth.
Fast paced. Easy to follow as Roberts does not make the typical mistake of including too many characters.
YES it’s predictable and sentimental.
Still, I enjoyed all 3 predictable and sentimental books. I wished there were more in the series.
Once again, I have to point out that Nora Roberts does not get the respect she deserves.
She publishes so frequently. And sells so many books, that very few bother writing reviews.
Divine Evil (2010) is another entertaining story, well told.
Not her best book of the 270+. But well worth reading.
Clare Kimball, an accomplished sculptor, is troubled by depression and the return of childhood nightmares. So she takes a break from New York City and heads for her sleepy hometown in Maryland, despite its association with her beloved father’s violent but apparently accidental death.
Cameron Rafferty, formerly the town hellion, is now the sheriff and faced with a puzzle: the century-old grave of an infant has been dug up. In fact, the grave was robbed by Satan worshipers; Clare’s dreams date from the night in her childhood when she saw them performing a coven ceremony–and they know she saw them.
Cam’s problems are compounded when the mutilated corpse of his hated stepfather is discovered in a field after the two have a public fistfight. …
The 2023 book by Barclay is as terrific as the rest.
Jack Givins’ father was a killer for hire — whisked away by witness protection, leaving Jack and his mother to pick up the shattered pieces of their lives as best they could.
Years later, Jack is a grown man with problems of his own.
He’s a talented but struggling author, barely scraping by on the royalties from his moderately successful first book.
So when the U.S. Marshals approach him with a lucrative opportunity, he’s in no position to turn them down. They’re recruiting writers like Jack to create false histories for people in witness protection—people like Jack’s father.
The coincidence is astonishing to Jack at first, but he soon realizes this may be a chance to find his dad. Only there’s one problem—Jack’s father hasn’t made contact with his handlers recently, and they have no idea where he is. He could be in serious danger, and Jack may be the only one who can find him.
But how will he find a man he’s never truly known? A man who has done terrible things in his lifetime and made some deadly enemies in the process—enemies who wouldn’t think twice about using his own son against him.
The Passage focuses on Project Noah, a secret medical facility where scientists are experimenting with a dangerous virus that could lead to the cure for all disease, but also carries the potential to wipe out the human race.
… begins in 2016 and spans more than ninety years, as colonies of humans attempt to live in a world filled with superhuman creatures who are continually on the hunt for fresh blood. …
… two sections: the first and shorter section covers the origins of the virus and its outbreak, while the second is set 93 years after the infections, primarily following a colony of survivors living in California. …
I quite enjoyed the long book and was keen to press on.
Good characters. I was never lost.
It’s said the middle book of a trilogy is typically worst.
Too much confusing jumping forward and backward in time.
I didn’t like the characters and their stories nearly as much as in the first book.
The ending was probably the best part. It did tie up some of the many, many loose threads. Of course it made no sense. How does an explosion kill super beings and yet leave mere mortals alive?
Rick McCharles 