Nordic Noir at its best

I knew this would be a long one so it had to be a very complex case with very many complex characters. And I was t wrong. I still almost gave up, not because the gruesome crimes and dark undertones, but the number of characters confused the hell out of me. I had to make a list of characters to use as cheat list with the changes between countries and murder scenes and characters at play. As quickly as the scenery evolved as quickly did the suspects change or develop and I was never sure when it was just a twist or a new revelation. All was woven together by the backstory which more and more got a foot in the actual and current murders and got the tension and suspense heated up to fever pitch. Parallel to the murders and investigations all characters had their own struggles and this became a decisive factor in the stories without taking over. All in all not a negative experience, on the contrary. The visual aspects of the crimes, the chase for the perpetrators and the personal and social consequences of their actions made this a great audio experience.
Only small dent was the length, it wasn’t too long and not a slow burner it just made the suspense immense and you better take a week end off. And of course now you need to trade the follow up books as no way can you let go of the characters now that you got invested into their investigations and the crimes. There is so much more to come.
It’s a pity though that not all the books are on audio. I got used now to Swedish and Danish characters with regional UK accents. Not a bad idea it turns out as it’s very tricky to use multiple regional foreign accents and make sure they differ as much as danish and Swedish so it works for me. Jonathan Keeble is a great narrator and I have heard him reading audiobooks with Nordic accents and it’s clear from his pronunciation of places and addresses and names that he’s quite good at it but it’s impossible for English speakers to get various different regional Nordic accents right. And now I have a voice in my head for all main actors so I’d love to get them all in form of audiobooks. There was a recent book published and another one to follow on kindle so I’m hopeful.

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Good and not so good

It’s a good story but far too many characters, at points of it I had no clue what was going on. Dozens of police , dozens of victims, stacks of perpetrators. The narrator, who’s voice I actually liked for some unknown reason chose to use a Scottish accent, a Belfast accent, a Geordie accent and a London accent even though the book was set in Denmark and Sweden plus a bit of Israel. It wasn’t until the last 1/3 of the book that I figured out who was who. But I kept going to the end as I’d got used to the style. Defo worth a listen even with the downsides

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Gripping story

Great listen but some of the characters have similar sounding names and it was easy to confuse the Danish & Swedish narratives. Parts of the storyline were frustrating (why not call for back up - over & over) but for free entertainment, it's hard to complain!

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Really good start to the series

Despite the title of this review, I'm going to confess to listening to this out of turn (after the first 2) but I'm very glad I did as it made more sense of the complicated backstory. I'm now completely hooked and looking forward to what comes next. I've seen reviews questioning why the narrator chooses Irish accents for the Danes, but once you tune in to the idea it really helps you understand which police force is at work and where the action is taking place. I've heard the same technique used elsewhere and it didn't bother me at all, in fact I like it! I would strongly recommend this series! Well done to both writer and narrator. Keep it up!!

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1 person found this helpful

Good story

The narrator's strange pronunciation of certain words kept distracting me from the story. Otherwise a good story

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Not for me

I am an avid book reader and it is not very often that I want a book to end... I found this book disjointed, full of holes in the plot and totally rubbish... however, i had to finish it out of sheer desperation. I have not read any of Stefan Ahnhem's books before and I was guided by a review... I will not be reading any more of his work.

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Voices

Sorry had to stop listening because of the silly accents. The books after this are okay

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