This is the first book of a series. I've downloaded the second and the third is coming in May. And it's going to be a big winner. Thanks to Henning Mankell, Jo Nesbo and the late Stieg Larrsen, if it's set in Scandanavia, it gets translated and I for one am very thankful.
The Copenhagen PD is so frustrated with Carl Morck that they jump at the opportunity to utilize the wizened detective as a pawn in a political power play. The national legislature wants to set aside some funding for cold cases of a public nature and the PD is happy to take the money and set up Carl as the Superintendent of Dept. Q. He's given an office in the basement with a Syrian janitor as his only help and the Homicide Dept. can use the extra money to fund ongoing cases.
With the perfect mix of cynicism and wit, Carl picks a five-year-old case and starts delving. Merete Lynggaard was a rising politician when she disappeared from a Baltic ferry and the face of the earth. She had been orphaned when her dad accidentally ran another car off an icy winter road. A boy in the other car plots his family's revenge and fifteen years after the accident, kidnaps Merete. She was an assumed suicide and the police inquiry was sloppy. As Carl and Assad inquire, research, pursue and eventually solve the matter, it is clear that Assad is more than a political refugee janitor. He has some very obvious police and military skills. I suspect there will be some very interesting inter-play between Carl and Assad as we go forth.
I generally prefer novels that give you a sense of a place. This fails entirely in that regard. The other Scandanavians mentioned above are very good at that: Mankell - Ystad; Nesbo - Oslo; and Larrsen - Stockholm make it feel as if you are walking down their chilly streets. This book offers zero feel for Copenhagen, but has a helluva story to tell.
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