The Writing In The Water, Lindqvuist - B+

         Julia Malmro, a successful middle-aged writer researching a book, meets a 28-year-old cracker (someone who pierces firewalls for fun). They have a wild weekend fling, and Kim disappears from her life. Kim, though, is more than a wealthy slacker. While hanging out in Cuba, he uncovered a ring of 340 Swedish pedophiles, a painful process given that he was cut by his grandfather and abused by a physician. They reconnect at Kim's summer home a few months later when a group of neighbors are murdered just across the bay. The host of the party is a childhood friend. Kim takes a peek at the dark web and concludes it’s highly likely the victim had been hiding wealth, engaging in illegal activities, and was killed by professionals. Kim shares this with Julia and heads to the sanitarium where the host’s teenage daughter is being held. As she is being cared for by the electrotherapy torturer and abusive doctor who once treated him—and after he rescued Astrid from the lake following the shooting—he’s not about to let her be abused again. He easily saves her and manages to obtain a video from the boy she was talking to when her parents were murdered. Surreptitiously, he slips it to the police, who, among other things, hear Chinese spoken in the video. The lead detective now knows he has a case involving money likely coming from Shanghai, Red Army machine guns, and Chinese spoken in a Shanghai dialect. Kim decides it’s time to visit Shanghai, and at this point, everyone is certain the deceased—and at least one of his guests—was up to no good. In Shanghai, Kim learns that a major Swedish industrialist, one whom the government would not wish to embarrass or offend, was likely also involved. The two men confirmed as the killers, who had failed to kill Kim in Shanghai, are later found executed there. Kim stops in Cuba, does some work, and confirms the identity of the Swedish industrialist. There’s a fabulous ending with all the bad guys hauled in. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the two most successful Scandinavian thrillers to come to my attention—the Millennium series and Jo Nesbø’s books about Harry Hole. This is just as good, if not better.