“This is definitely a page turner and the ending will come as a real shock. Ragnar Jónasson is definitely one to add if you like Nordic Noir even darker.”
NO MAJOR SPOILERS
Hulda Hermannsdóttir is being forced to retire early, told to clear her desk she has been given the opportunity to work out her last days looking into any cold case she wishes. She chooses one of a murdered asylum seeker, her body found washed up on a remote rocky beach.
To start with, she chooses the case as she feels it was not investigated properly in the first place. She thinks that the detective who ran the case is, at best, useless. Although there initially seems very little to go on, it becomes clear that there is more to the case. She goes back to the scene and the victims hostel, she discovers that another woman went missing a year before this murder. She was never reported missing but was thought to be still in hiding or left the country.
Along with this, Hulda has a new man in her life, the first one since her husband died some years before. Hulda has many secrets, her early life is told in snap-shot short chapters alongside her investigation and current life. Her new man is giving her hope for a future that she thought she would never see and eventually sees the retirement as the start of a new chapter in her life.
The investigation into the murder progresses but she is coming under increasing pressure from her superior to close the case and walk away. She will wish she had.
I’ve read the four Dark Iceland books translated into English and really enjoyed them. This new series in what is being called Hidden Iceland gets off to a fantastic start. This is definitely a page turner and the ending will come as a real shock. I had to stop, think, then reread the last few pages just to be sure I had read it right. Ragnar Jónasson is definitely one to add if you like Nordic Noir even darker.
Reviewed by:
Trevor Litchfield
Added 25th December 2018