The Thirst

About a year ago, we tried to listen to this book by try-rigging cables and wires to get a smart-phone to play through a stupid car stereo system. It was a long road trip and we wanted to listen to some Jo Nesbø. I hold this book directly responsible for us buying a new car with Car Play on it and then our subsequent car trip up the east coast, to Canada, and back. The book kept us going on the drive north, but it took 2.5 more books to get us home again. We both love the Harry Hole series, and other books by Nesbø. This did not disappoint. Of note: more references to Nesbø's other world in music. Also, for the first time in our 34 years of marriage, we discussed plot angles and possibilities as the book was winding up. Good stuff.

A top class thriller from Jo Nesbo and his antihero Harry Hole. Harry is now lecturing but is requested by the police in Oslo to head up a small team and help trace a killer who is using "vampire" techniques to attack and kill his victims. At a 538 page count this is a long and at sometimes complex book but for those who have followed Harry through his drunken alcoholic binges and failed relationships the book does not disappoint and once again we can see just why Jo Nesbo is revered as a writer of superior nordic crime fiction. Harry's relationship with Rakel and her son Oleg is severely tested when an incident occurs that nearly destroys his now settled domestic life....."He walked quickly past Rakel without looking at her, without a show more word of farewell. She was already sidelined, pushed from his consciousness by one of his two lover. Alcohol and murder." Returning to the pressure of fronting a murder investigation opens the way for the "demon" drink to once again present as a problem to our nonconformist cop..."He needed a drink. Harry didn't know where the thought came from, but there it was, as if someone had shouted it, spelling it out, straight into his ear. The thought needed to be drowned out quickly." So a good read with a central character haunted by the actions and events that had happened to him in the past.."Harry stared at the ceiling. The ghosts hadn't come. Maybe they wouldn't be coming tonight. You never knew....." show less

Jo Nesbo always has me worried that there won't be another Harry Hole book at the end of every novel. This is the what I wrote about the tenth book 'Police'.

".... Nesbo snatches it away again in the final pages with another gut wrenching ending that will have fans counting down the days 'til the next entry in this fantastic series."

Well, three years later, the eleventh book - The Thirst - is here. And, boy oh boy, was it worth the wait! I have loved every one of the 'Harry' books, but have to say this is, in my opinion, the best one - yet.

Tinder users swipe right to say yes. In The Thirst, they don't realize they're also saying yes to death. Someone is using the hook-up app as a trolling ground for a killing spree. What's really show more frightening is the method - and weapon - he's using. And that there may be a connection to a past case - one of Harry Hole's. "Now it was time. Time he drank from the well of life again. Time he returned."

Harry is enjoying his life - he has stopped drinking, works as a college crime lecturer and life with Rakel and Oleg is good. But...there's that pull, that undercurrent, that frisson of excitement, the draw to the darkness, the thrill of the chase. "Possible the best, possibly the worst, but certainly the most mythological murder detective in the Oslo Police..."

Readers will be happy to hear that Harry is still Harry - a dark, dangerous, conflicted and complicated protagonist I can't get enough of. While Harry is reluctantly pulled out of retirement, the rest of the supporting players are still in place. The one we love to hate - the self-serving chief, the ones we cheer for - the dogged crime tech, former protegees of Harry and some new additions. There are undercurrents to each player's life that also drive the plot forward, in addition to the main plot. Supporting characters also have a voice and POV. The reader is privy to the maneuvering happening behind the scenes.

And what a plot it is! Brilliant, gritty, action packed and completely unpredictable. Nesbo absolutely kept me guessing. I was pretty sure I knew who the killer was. I did and I didn't. Nesbo fooled me - I love not be able to figure out the answers in a crime novel. And just when I thought things were tied up, I realized there were still one hundred pages to go! The ending? Absolutely perfect and unexpected. I cannot wait for book twelve!

The Thirst is a great title - it can be interpreted in so many ways - through both the killer's and Harry's eyes. . If you've not read this series before, I encourage you to start at the beginning to fully appreciate this character and Nesbo's writing. Absolutely recommended! show less

Book # 11 in the Harry Hole series

Our unorthodox detective is back, facing another killer, one that will remind him of an old nemesis in his past. In this chilling and emotionally charged mystery Harry is drawn back to the Oslo police force and soon is on the tail of a serial killer working the streets and targeting people using the online dating service, Tinder.

This is a crime fiction at its best: gritty, atmospheric, violent and gripping. “The Thirst” is top notch writing and one of the bloodiest novels written by Mr. Nesbo. I was immediately drawn into a dark police investigation and as the layers slowly revealed themselves I was not only caught up in a cat-and- mouse chase but also in a twisted and breathless journey into the show more mind of a depraved killer. What a razor-sharp and masterfully plotted “The Thirst” is. Not to forget the vivid and wonderful although rather complex characters that populate the pages, what more can we wish for.

OK, this novel is brutally violent and the story is laced with melancholy but take it from me this is one gripping white-knuckle ride that deploys all the key ingredients of a cracking good thriller: Tension expertly ratcheted upwards, effortlessly shifting objectives and scenery and a tempo that will outpace our ability to guess the outcome. What an ending…..

I received this ARC for review from Penguin Random House Canada via NetGalleys show less

Als begeisterter Harry-Hole-Fan wird es natürlich schwierig, eine wirklich objektive Kritik zu schreiben - aber ich versuche mein Bestes ;-)
Wie schon im vorherigen Band Koma: Kriminalroman (Ein Harry-Hole-Krimi, Band 10) geht es Harry Hole erstaunlicherweise noch immer gut: glücklich verheiratet mit Rakel, seiner großen Liebe; seine Aufgabe als Dozent an der Polizeihochschule macht ihm noch immer Freude und seine frühere Ermittlungsarbeit fehlt ihm nicht im Geringsten. Doch als in Oslo zwei Frauen umgebracht werden, deren Blut der Täter offenbar getrunken hat, setzt ihn Mikael Bellmann, der Polizeipräsident und Intimfeind Harrys, unter Druck, damit er in diesen Fällen ermittelt. Denn der Täter ist offenbar kein Unbekannter show more ...
Wer noch keinen Harry-Hole-Krimi gelesen und die Befürchtung hat, es könnte das Lesevergnügen vermindern, nun beim 11. Band direkt einzusteigen, kann beruhigt sein. Zwar gibt es immer wieder Hinweise auf die Vergangenheit, aber zum Verständnis dieses Thriller sind die vorhergehenden Bände nicht nötig. Also nur ran an die über 600 Seiten ;-)
Es ist praktisch von Beginn an klar, wer der Täter ist - zumindest soll man das glauben. Die Jagd nach ihm umfasst mehr als drei Viertel des Buches und ist durchweg spannend. Immer wieder gibt es kleine Hinweise, dass mehr dahinter stecken könnte als auf den ersten Blick zu erkennen ist, doch erst im dritten Teil wird dies wirklich deutlich. Obwohl Jo Nesbø 'nur' wieder seine altbekannten Schachzüge einsetzt wie zwei Handlungen unmittelbar aufeinanderprallen zu lassen, die sich jedoch an völlig unterschiedlichen Orten abspielen; oder Sachverhalte ohne Namensnennung zu beschreiben, sodass man fast sicher ist, es kann sich nur um die und die Person handeln - tut es aber nicht. Obwohl die Technik also bekannt ist (ich habe alle Harry-Hole-Bände gelesen), bin ich beinahe stets auf's Neue diesen Irreführungen erlegen, was die Spannung natürlich beträchtlich erhöhte. Wirklich bis zum Schluss werden diese Verwirrspiele durchgehalten und führen zu einer Auflösung, die im Gegensatz zu den vorhergehenden Fällen jedoch nur an einem Indiz festzumachen war. Dieses Mal habe ich mir also nichts vorzuwerfen im Sinne von 'Das hättest Du doch erkennen können' ;-)
Eine kleine Mäkelei habe ich aber dennoch: Natürlich werden auch hier Personen als mögliche Verdächtige aufgebaut, um die Lesenden in die Irre zu leiten. Das geschah aber dieses Mal bei Zweien derart plump, dass sofort klar war: Die können es nicht sein. Ich kann mich erinnern, das ging auch schon besser ;-)
Dennoch ist es wieder ein richtig toller Harry-Hole-Fall, der viel zu schnell durchgelesen war. show less

Harry Hole returns for an eleventh book in The Thirst, the latest of Norwegian Jo Nesbø's crime thrillers set in Oslo, Norway. Hole has retired from the murder detective business and is teaching in Oslo’s police academy when a series of grisly murders rocks Oslo. The killer appears to be a “vampirist,” someone who drinks the blood of his victims - presumably, it is thought, to get some kind of kinky sexual thrill.

The early chapters of the book deal with a lot of intramural infighting in the Oslo police department. From a plot perspective, this is necessary to get Harry back into the thick of the investigation as opposed to being merely a lecturer in the academy.

Nesbø is at his grizzly, creepy best as he describes the show more killer’s stalking and disposing of victims. My wife found this aspect of the book to be either too scary or too disgusting to finish and quit early on after “encountering” the killer’s pointed steel dentures. Nonetheless, there’s a lot more to engage the reader intellectually if one perseveres.

Harry assembles a team made up of some characters from previous books as well as a few new additions. His detective instincts come back into full flower as the danger to him increases.

Clever and surprising twists keep the reader on edge, leading up to an exciting coda in the final third of the book. As with previous books by this author, when the twists come, you realize they had been set up all along from the beginning, if only you had been able to recognize them. It’s the kind of plotting device that makes you feel like reading each book a second time!

Discussion: Jo Nesbø is not only an imaginative writer of crime thrillers; he is also a rock musician. Further, he is an opinionated critic of the current and recent pop music scene. He can’t resist asserting (through his characters) his personal evaluations of various real life popular and not so popular musicians and groups. But this also serves as a break for the readers, providing a way to cope with all the suspense.

Evaluation: The book is more than a thrilling who-done-it that will hold your attention. It is also a multi-layered psychological study of not only Harry, but of several of the other principle characters, and of Shakespeare’s Othello.

(JAB) show less

Women are being murdered by a killer who uses Tinder as his hunting ground, who uses spiked iron dentures as his weapon of choice, and who literally has a taste for blood. Harry Hole has retired from the police force but he is lured back and begins a hunt for a particularly vicious serial killer.

If you haven’t encountered Harry Hole, he’s “Possibly the best, possibly the worst, but certainly the most mythologized murder detective in the Oslo Police” (91). When Hole appears at his first meeting of the investigative team, a former colleague reflects: “He may well have been Crime Squad’s drunk, arrogant enfant terrible, someone who had directly or indirectly cause the deaths of other officers, and whose working methods were show more highly questionable. But he still made them sit up and pay attention. Because he still had the same dour, almost frightening charisma, and his achievements were beyond question” (114). Harry is torn between keeping his wife content and his family safe and “his compulsive attraction to hunting murderers” (298). Does he have a “black heart” whose obsession with tracking down killers is a thirst “like a fire . . . [which] until it’s quenched, it’ll keep growing, devouring everything it comes into contact with” (154) or is he “a good person . . . [motivated by] the good herding instinct. With morals and responsibility towards everyone” (298)? It is this very conflicted Harry Hole who returns to detective work; as before, he disobeys rules and superiors, sometimes with very negative consequences.

This same colleague muses that, “Off the top of her head, she could only think of one person he had failed to catch” (114). Of course, it is this one person, the one who gets away at the end of Police, who challenges Harry’s skill as a detective. The killer leaves clues to his identity so that Harry knows, “’He wants to play’” (113), and the two are soon engaged in an intricate cat-and-mouse game. What follows is a very complex plot with lots of twists.

Unfortunately, I found some of the plot broke the bounds of credibility. Harry’s final encounter with the criminal mastermind, for example, had me shaking my head, as did the escape of a suspect from prison (147). The plot seems very contrived in places. A character’s illness, for instance, is just a ploy to add another suspect to the mix, and connections between characters are just too convenient. Almost everyone is made to be suspect and some of the red herrings are rather heavy-handed. And the intelligent Harry Hole makes decisions that are just plain stupid. He seems to have learned nothing from his previous mistakes because he, as in previous books, puts others in harm’s way.

This book can be read as a standalone, but readers who have read the entire series will have a better understanding of the complex Harry Hole and the developing relationships among characters. Certainly a reading of Police is recommended because this is really a sequel to it. Another Harry Hole book will definitely follow since the ending suggests a calm before another storm. Obviously, Harry’s personal life will continue to be complicated, especially when a character regrets, “There was something she should have told [Harry]” (456) when she thinks he is dead.

I have read all the Harry Hole books and I’ve enjoyed most of them very much. I feel like a traitor but I must say that this novel is a weak addition to the series.

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