Carin Gerhardsen

A few unrelated middle-aged people are found murdered in different parts of Sweden. Unrelated, that is, until the police find out that they all went to kindergarten together. But what could possibly happen in the world of six-year-olds that would cause someone to go on a rampage 38 years later?

Great page-turner of a police procedural with the added bonus of the reader getting intermitted updates from the murderer about what "progress" is being made. Initially, I thought I would be irritated show more by our Chief Inspector, Conny Sjöberg - his home life is just a bit too cozy and cute - but he managed to be clever enough to escape any severe judgment.

Mainly interesting is how Gerhardsen is able to make the murderer's motivation quite understandable (or even justifiable?) while keeping the crimes absolutely despicable. She uses the book to raise a lot of good questions about civic and personal responsibility, but still provides a riveting read - no preaching, just a gentle (and quite, quite heartbreaking) nudge. show less

Vilken fullträff till spännande bok för mellanåldern och yngre tonåringar! Från första till sista sidan satt jag med andan i halsen och ville veta mer om hur allting skulle gå. Alla personer som är med känns trovärdiga nog för att historien ska fungera trots att det inte är alltför mycket beskrivningar i boken. Det är väldigt mycket action i ordets alla bemärkelser.

Det enda minuset, som inte ens drar ner betyget för min del, var att den enda människa vars kroppsform show more kommenterades mer än nån enstaka gång var mosterns. Att hon var tjock/rund/stor återkom flertalet gånger, till synes helt utan anledning. Det ställs i kontrast mot till exempel en av tvillingarna som vann OS-guld och beskrevs som vältränad till skillnad från sin tvillingbror en 2-3 gånger. Jag är för inkluderande av kroppstyper i en bok men det var något med beskrivningen här som var off. Dock, som sagt, inget som tog mig ur berättelsen nämvärt eller gör att jag tar bort en stjärna från boken. En halv kanske. Boken får 4.5 stjärna!

Texten i sig var lättläst, något som jag vet Petter Lidbeck är bra på, med ett luftigt och modernt språk. Det i samband med den spännande handlingen gör att jag tror att boken kan fungera bra även för tonåringar med lässvårigheter även om målgruppen för boken är 9-12åringar. show less

Crime fiction has a great deal of variety, with readers able to choose among police procedurals, hitman stories, gruesome serial killer thrillers, and conspiracy-driven plots. In THE SAINT, Swedish author Carin Gerhardsen offers them all in a single package.

The book begins as a classic procedural, with a team of a half dozen police officers working as a team to solve a murder. A man with a sterling reputation has been shot dead in the forest, with the only clue an incomplete poker hand show more tucked in his pocket, along with a blurry series of ink-smudged figures. Given that the man was an upstanding family man who coached children's soccer teams and took food to homeless people, nobody can imagine who would want him dead. Since he had just left a poker game the night of the murder, they first begin by questioning the men he played with, all of whom have something in their past that makes them at least somewhat suspicious.

As is customary, there are relationships among the police to unpack and instances where their personal lives take the foreground. One officer in particular, a new member of the team, is a puzzle to Chief Inspector Conny Sjöberg, the leader of the squad. Yet she is the one who brings a sharp intellect to bear on several of the challenges they face.

After chasing down clues for all of the poker players, their case is suddenly blown open when it seems an unexpected perpetrator is likely the guilty party. It's only after leads are chased down and an arrest is made that the team can relax - at least until they realize their initial investigation uncovered tantalizing clues to a series of crimes that had never been solved, or in some cases never investigated, shifting the genre gears again into gruesome serial killer territory. Finally, there's some evidence of a conspiracy involving rape brought to light in the final pages, a plot line apparently introduced in previous entries in the series.

There are a lot of characters to keep track of (with a list provided to help), a plot that offers quite a few clever twists, and a pace that starts out slow and gains speed as the genre changes are rung. The translation is serviceable but seems more literal than graceful. This novel, the fourth in the Hammarby series, was originally published in 2011 and is the first to be published in English by Mysterious Press, though a scattering of others are available in English translation from other publishers. While it will be of interest to Scandi Noir fans, particularly those who enjoy sensational plots more than sociological exploration, it doesn't really offer anything new. show less

This is a tough book to review.
The story, and the creativity of the way it unfolds is 5 stars. But it is way too long, filled with pages of unneeded details of what the main characters are thinking, feeling, acting etc. I also think the fact the the book is translated from Swedish to English, is a problem. What should have been an edge of your seat thriller, ends up moving at a snails pace and worse comes off as boring. I mean really boring. I admit that this has been a problem for me with show more other Scandinavian books that were translated. The stories are well thought out but come across as too long and boring. show less