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Loading... The Hypnotist (2009)by Lars Kepler
 bonniemarjorie | May 7, 2013 |  Tumba, Sweden. A triple homicide, all of the victims from the same family, captivates Detective Inspector Joona Linna, who demands to investigate the grisly murders — against the wishes of the national police. The killer is at large, and it appears that the elder sister of the family escaped the carnage; it seems only a matter of time until she, too, is murdered. But where can Linna begin? The only surviving witness is an intended victim– the boy whose mother, father, and little sister were killed before his eyes. Whoever committed the crimes intended for this boy to die: he has suffered more than one hundred knife wounds and lapsed into a state of shock. He’s in no condition to be questioned. Desperate for information, Linna sees one mode of recourse: hypnotism. He enlists Dr. Erik Maria Bark to mesmerize the boy, hoping to discover the killer through his eyes. It’s the sort of work that Bark had sworn he would never do again– ethically dubious and psychically scarring. When he breaks his promise and hypnotizes the victim, a long and terrifying chain of events begins to unfurl. The disturbing image on the book cover hints at what is in store for the reader in this gripping, all engrossing slice of ‘Nordic Noir’. Full of interesting, complex characters plus an intelligent plot makes this so much more than just a thriller. The novel has a lot to say on the failures of society, damaged psyches and family bonds Be warned it is very dark, very Gothic and the reader finds themselves in a very alarming place indeed. .. and they haven’t even got to the bit about the teenage Pokemon crime ring! (  ) jan.fleming | May 2, 2013 | Wow. Wow. Wow. Fantabulantanticous!!! First book in a new Swedish detective crime series has all the ingredients for a major high stakes serial killer thriller mystery story. There are so many related storylines and plots in this horrifying crime that one never knows where the next thing will come from. At first the book seems to be going in the ordinary way of any ordinary mystery and a perp. has been found but... what? only 1/4 of the way into the book... what could possibly happen next? Kepler has oh so much more in store that it is page-turningly impossible to keep up with him. I adored his use of being in the past switching to the present then going back into the immediate past, back and forth until a certain part of the book we need to be immersed into a time period ten years earlier to learn the background that is connected to this present state of affairs. The author manipulates both the multiple time scene changes and multiple cast members with dexterity, never once leaving me feeling dangling. I had a firm grip the whole time and was on the edge of my seat literally from paragraph one. It is hard to tell who the main characters that will follow over into the next volume will be though. Of course DI Joona Linna, but we don't get to know him very well, in this book. We do get to know Dr. Erik Bark much more personally but was he just around for this event or will he be a recurring character. I'd like to see his return. Guess I'll find out soon as "The Nightmare" is coming up soon on my bedtime table. Highly recommended for Scandi-crime fans! (  ) ElizaJane | Apr 30, 2013 | The story held my interest, but the writing kind of annoyed me. The present tense threw me off and the overuse of adverbs was almost funny. (I listened to the audiobook so maybe I was just more attuned to the adverbs.) There's a flashback mid-way through the book that occurs in an odd spot and is rather drawn out, although I'm not sure where else it could be placed in the story. Some of the investigation parts are disjointed. Don't you investigate the scene of a crime right away, and check for fingerprints? The sex scenes were more graphic than I feel they needed to be. I'm no prude, but it just seemed gratuitous. I didn't have a lot of sympathy for some of the characters, particularly the hypnotist. And some characters are not fleshed out much. But this book has a lot of suspense when it gets going, so my rating it more for the story than the writing. Story=3, writing=2. (  ) Cather00 | Apr 27, 2013 | half-way through this book and already all i could think about is when this ordeal of a read will end! the blurbs have proclaimed it 'ferocious...visceral...mesmerizing', and there's also no end of regular readers who genuinely enjoyed this...maybe i was just in a really foul mood when i read this? its messy, incoherent, and bland! i could not make myself care for any of the characters (they're very infuriating). big moments and reveals have drawn out nothing from me but resigned sighs and eye-rolling. by the second half, the book has finally started to gain traction. but by then i was irredeemably lost and blissfully imagining (and rightfully/luckily guessing) the end. to be fair, i think the material may translate better in the big screen, or as a serialized tv drama. though i think i'll be skipping those too if/when they come out. (  ) riida | Apr 23, 2013 |
 Linna and Bark make a great crime-solving pair precisely because they puzzle each other so thoroughly—says Bark, for instance, “The patient always speaks the truth under hypnosis. But it’s only a matter of what he himself perceives as the truth.” To which Linna responds, “What is it you’re trying to say?” Indeed. What Bark is trying to say is that there are monsters hiding everywhere beneath the reasonable and rational, and Kepler’s book makes for a satisfying and scary testimonial.
References to this work on external resources.
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Swedish Detective Inspector Joona Linna investigates the murders of three family members whose killing was witnessed by a fourth intended victim, a traumatized child whose shock Linna hopes to penetrate through hypnotism.
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I had high hopes for The Hypnotist by Lars Keplar (a husband and wife writing team) after winning it on Goodreads and seeing it in my Sunday paper that very same week. Excited to finally win something worth my time from Goodreads I picked it up as soon as it arrived at my door.
If you, like me, heard that this is the 'next Stieg Larsson', then you know that that did nothing but set your expectations high in order for them to be dashed. The writing was exciting but the characters were dreadfully dull and parts of the novel simply didn't make any sort of sense.
In the past year I think I read bits and pieces of this at least half a dozen times and ended up dragging myself through the finish line. Suffice it to say I was not impressed and won't be waiting eagerly for the other installments to be released to the US. (