The Ice Princess

I really love how Läckberg brings to life this part of Sweden and its (sometimes "special") type of people. Normally, I would be annoyed if there were so many different threads in one mystery-novel, but here it gives such a flavor to the environment that it's a joy to read. I'm wondering how the English translation reads, since the some quirks in the language is truly reflecting how people talk in the Fjällbacka area, but I think that even if you miss the flavor or nuances of the language, it's still a great mystery with a very genuine and truthful (flaws and all) love story added in. The only issue I had is that sometimes a character will figure something out, but won't tell the reader which is a bit annoying, but hopefully just a show more symptom of a first novel. show less

Having read but not completed Helen Tursten's Detective Irene Huss series, I learned about another Swedish mystery series writer, Camilla Lackberg.

The Ice Princess reads like butter. Lackberg is a master of getting the complexities of all kinds of relationships right. And shows how we all struggle starting and maintaining our connections to others; never comes easy.

This first book in the series shows how keeping silent about heinous crimes is never a good idea and usually leads to more violence. Its also about how we rightly or wrongly go about protecting those we love.

Lots of action, great characters, good dialogue; understandable, exciting and sad.

Great read.

There was something I absolutely loved about this story. I'm sure it had something to do with drawing me into the actual crimes involved, coupled with the other storylines of love and family relationships. On their own merits, each storyline isn't super strong, but the combination of them made for a read that pulled me in and left me without any other jobs in my house getting done today.

I loved the criminal storyline - I had so many predictions, and to be honest, NONE of them were accurate. I wasn't blown away with an OMG kind of moment, my hypotheses were just off.

As for the secondary storylines, we're kind of left hanging. It definitely felt like the first in a series with the love story - there's obviously more to come there.

I show more adored Patrik's character - loved the scenes with him trying on clothes to find something that fit... I also loved Lackberg's writing style and look forward to reading more from her! show less

This is not a terrible book. Erica, the author of a series of biographies of Swedish women, returns to her hometown, a small coastal village, upon the sudden deaths of her parents. She's going through their things and working on her latest book, when she finds the body of a childhood friend. The mystery of Alex's death, who killed her and the unraveling of her final hours interests Erica, who sees a book in it. Did Alex really have a romantic relationship with the town drunk? And how is the most powerful family in town involved?

Spoiler Alert
There could be a good crime novel here, but the book is let down by the sloppiness of the writing. In one scene, the police officer realizes that he's been wearing the same clothes for three days, show more because he has just started a steamy relationship with Erica (and, seriously? Five times a night?). In the following scene, Erica sends her sister up to her room and then is embarrassed because her new lover has left his clothes scattered everywhere. It's things like that that make me think I'm reading a first draft and to wonder why I should take the time to read the damn thing when it's clear the author didn't.

There's an alarming veer over into chick-lit when Erica meets Officer Patrik and begins to worry a lot about what underwear to wear and how many weight watchers points are in any given food. Oddly, her new love echoes her concerns and spends loads of time choosing outfits and bemoaning the size of his ass.

The secondary characters are paper-thin caricatures with women often portrayed as ice-cold bitches or gold-digging tramps and the men as abusers or careless philanderers.

And, finally, the mystery is held together by a series of documents whose contents the people in the book are privy to long before the reader. If the mystery could be cleared up using knowledge held by the main characters, I call cheating. I was surprised to read on the flap that Lackberg is a ginormous bestselling author in Sweden, but then again, I'm often surprised by what makes the lists here. show less

Erica Falck’s day is turned upside down when she discovers the body of a childhood friend in a small Swedish town. At first, the police assume that an alcoholic artist is the killer. But an alibi from a neighbour suggests that he could not have done the deed. Then the drunk is found hanged in his apartment and the police investigation is back at square one. And Erica finds herself falling for Patrik Hedstrom, one of the policemen on the case, and another childhood friend that she had lost track of. It seems that the whole town is embroiled in a mystery that both Erica and Patrik seek to resolve.

The story evolves slowly, so you have to stay with it, but the revelations in the second half of the book are well worth waiting for. The show more thoughts of the characters are exposed in a way that allows us to judge their motivations. Without revealing too much, it is a take on betrayal by individuals in a small town setting and the struggle to survive that betrayal. It is typical of the noir fiction that has emerged from Sweden over the last 30 years. show less

First Line: Eilert Berg was not a happy man.

After the death of her parents, biographer Erica Falck finds herself back in her hometown of Fjällbacka, Sweden. Simultaneously trying to go through her parents' things and finish work on her fifth book, Erica is finding both tasks distasteful. When her childhood friend is found with her wrists slashed in a frozen bath, Erica begins writing a memoir about her beautiful but remote friend in which she intends to answer questions about their lost friendship.

While Falck is conducting her own investigation, local detective Patrik Hedstrom is following his own leads on the woman's death. It is only when Erica and Patrik begin working together that the truth begins to emerge about the small town's show more past.

This is a mystery for those who are character-driven readers. Erica not only writes, grieves for her parents and her lost friendship with the deceased Alex, she has to deal with her younger sister and her grasping husband. Patrik is not only investigating the death of Erica's childhood friend, he has to cope with the boss from hell. Erica and Patrik are attracted to each other, and it's a romance that's well done: enough detail to make romance lovers' toes curl a bit without turning off those who prefer their whodunits with guns and no roses.

Läckberg's interest in people and motivation is clear in The Ice Princess. She also shows a great deal of skill in meting out details to keep the suspense percolating. I can't help but feel that, although she's got two great characters in Erica and Patrik, Läckberg has the most fun with Patrik's boss, Bertil Mellberg:

"What she considered his most repulsive feature, however, was the atrocious comb-over he had constructed to hide his bald pate. He had let the remaining strands of hair grow out-- his employees could only guess how long they must be-- and then he wound the hair round atop his head in an arrangement that most resembled an abandoned crow's nest."

What's scary about Mellberg is that, although his characterization borders on buffoonery, Läckberg doesn't put a foot wrong because I swear I once worked with his twin!

Mellberg aside, I truly enjoyed reading this book. Läckberg is a very visual writer; Scandinavian furniture makers, interior designers and food magazines are mentioned that were totally unknown to me, but I wasn't bothered. That's what an Internet connection and search engines are for. Looking up some of the unfamiliar names helped me see with Läckberg's eyes and educated me, all at the same time. For those readers who don't care about such things, they are very easily ignored.

I deduced what had happened to Alex as a child, but that didn't take away any enjoyment of this book. Good pacing and story combined with excellent characters and motivations to make for a very pleasurable read. I am now looking for the rest of the books in this series because I just have to know about the further adventures of Erica and Patrik. show less

Ice Princess by Camellia Lackberg I have a lot to say about this book.

It is a very good story that is not told very well. I found it unconvincing as a detective story. The detectives do not seem very bright or even like detectives at all. I saw no glimpses of deductive logic, more a case of contrived stumbling over clues.Some of the characters are clichés, the fat leery head detective had no aura of truth or authenticity at all. The rich wicked widow was likewise unconvincing. The head detective was a waste of story space and the rich wicked widow was a lost opportunity as she is a key character in the story.Either I lost the timeline or the author did at least once.And what is that thing with revealing the existence of certain clues show more but not revealing the clues themselves?

For example: At least twice if not more the author has one of the main characters find a piece of paper with writing on it and thinks to themselves, words to the effect of, "this changes everything", but does not tell us the readers what those words are.

WTF is that? Obviously we see that these clues are ultra significant but they are not revealed until many pages later.Unless I am mistaken, I thought that the job of the author was to leave clues in plain sight and leave us to work out the significance or otherwise of them, assuming that we are sharp enough to spot them in the first place. We should get to be full participants in the unfolding tale and it is the author pitting their wits against ours. Anything less is patronising.And detail, floods of irrelevant details. When Patrik goes into the female assistant's office there is half a page of detail about the interior decor which not only adds nothing but actually detracts from the flow of the story. I don't think I am being picky either. This was a constant scenario throughout the book. I have seen this tactic used in historical novels to good effect as it builds a picture that adds texture to the main story. But here it is simply annoying.Is there anything more unsatisfying than loose ends in a story. The character of the controlling abusive brother-in-law is built up to the point where the downtrodden wife and kids eventually leave him after he breaks his daughter's arm. But that's it. We have been lead to knowing that he doesn't stop until he gets what he wants and will stop at nothing until he gets it. The story of the murder finishes before the end of the book and I was waiting for the evil brother-in-law to rear his ugly head but no! Nothing. Nada. So what was the point of the evil brother-in-law? The sister could have just appeared for any reason. Don't get me wrong, I have no problem with dead ends in the plot to throw us off the scent but this was yet another pointless diversion that detracted As I said at the beginning of this rant it is a very good story that is not told very well and I will stand by that. This could have been a really good read. show less