CWA International shortlist – choices, choices!

Thanks to my FriendFeed friends, I was alerted to the shortlist announcement of the Crime Writer’s Association International Dagger for the best book in the realm of “crime, thriller, suspense or spy novels which have been translated into English from their original language, for UK publication.” The winner will be announced July 15. And good heavens, the Scandinavians are dominating, with three Swedes, one Norwegian, and one Icelander on the list; one Frenchwoman rounding out the pack.

Karin Alvtegen, Shadow, translated by McKinley Burnett, (Canongate)
Arnaldur Indriðason, Arctic Chill, translated by Bernard Scudder and Victoria Cribb (Harvill Secker)
Stieg Larsson, The Girl who played with Fire, translated by Reg Keeland (MacLehose Quercus)
Jo Nesbø, The Redeemer, translated by Don Bartlett (Harvill Secker)
Johan Theorin, Echoes from the Dead, translated by Marlaine Delargy (Doubleday)
Fred Vargas, The Chalk Circle Man, translated by Siân Reynolds (Harvill Secker)

Congratulations to the nominees, to their translators, and to the publishers who trust us to be interested in non-English-speaking parts of the world.

all kinds of krimi for alle

Sunnie wonders what’s up in Scandinavia that leads to such a large concentration of crime fiction writers. Is it the long winters that give time for imaginations to churn? Whatever the cause, she recommends Arnaldur Indridason’s Arctic Chill. It’s “a very solid police procedural indeed. But he has done much more than that. He also explores the issues of immigration and racism. Indridason also strikes a nice balance between the work of the detectives and their lives outside of their work.”

Peter Guttridge thinks Yrsa Sigurdardóttir’s My Soul to Take is a winner – “both frightening and funny – a terrific trick if you can pull it off.”

DJ reviews Anne Holt’s forthcoming (to the US market) crime novel, Death in Oslo which concerns America’s first female president. (Well, we got pretty close, but we have another first instead…) Anyway, she concludes,

This could easily have been a hardboiled thriller about politics and international crime, but Anne Holt has turned it into a story about human beings, especially by virtue of her engaging descriptions of some outstanding women. “We women and our damned secrets, she thought. Why is it like this? Why do we feel shame whether we have a reason or not? Where does it come from, this oppressing feeling of carrying around guilt?”

DJ goes on to say this is a book is one that fits her current “crime for all” project, a fascinating examination of femikrimi and machocrimi (themes at her blog for February and March) and books that are not specifically geared to men or women but appeal across the board (April’s theme). It has been a fascinating discussion – and one that has me thinking in new ways about books I’m reading. Some seem very deliberately pitched to a single sex by either emphasizing lots of action, large trucks, and explosions or by dwelling almost entirely on interpersonal relationships, sometimes with female leads who are either highly vulnerable and unable to protect themselves (as a rather lame ratchet for suspense) or dithering about romantic relationships (leading to book-shaped dents in my walls).

It seems to me that a lot of Scandinavian crime fiction manages to emphasize both relationships and a kind of tough-minded realism, a balance that sees crime itself as a manifestation of social relationships, an emphasis that goes back to Sjowall and Wahloo. And that’s most likely one of the reasons I find it so satisfying.

Crime for all – including the best impulses of the feminist turn in crime fiction from the late 70s – early 80s. Works for me!

review soup

More reviews of Swedish crime fiction. First, the much-awaited publication of Girl Who Played with Fire gets further notice. From the Times -

The essential first step to appreciating Stieg Larsson is to rid yourself of any fixed image you have of Swedish crime fiction. Yes, Larsson is a Swede, as is Henning Mankell and any number of other first-class spinners of mysteries. But the adventures of Inspector Kurt Wallander are far away from Larsson’s novels. If Mankell is Swedish gloomy, Larsson is Swedish noir. Very. . . .

[Salander is] unbelievable. All her attributes are exaggerated, at times veering to fantasy; her mental and physical strengths are beyond those of ordinary humans. Yet Larsson’s writing manages to make her intriguing, admirable and even – though this is an effort – sympathetic. . . .

The novel is complex in plot and characterisation, perhaps unnecessarily so. But the urgency of Larsson’s prose prevents boredom in reading a book that would otherwise be regarded as over-long and over-crammed. Somehow, Larsson has managed to write a riveting read.

And a nicely-calibrated review at Euro Crime – where, again, Salander’s major role is given some scrutiny:

There is also a strong element of male wish-fulfilment running through the book. Lisbeth is almost a Modesty Blaise-like figure at times, having her breasts enlarged, living off junk food yet remaining “anorexically thin” (as we are often reminded), and enjoying lusty sex with men and women. The Millennium journalists are similarly idealised, being portrayed as liberal-thinking, high on integrity and very highly sexed. On the other hand, most of the other men in the book are either decent enough yet bland (the police chief) or pure evil – rapists, abductors, child abusers and “men who hate women” to name but a few of the types in the pages. Most of these aspects add to the overall excitement, but they also create a slightly comic-book atmosphere.

Nevertheless, despite these flaws (some of which the author might have revised before publication had he lived) this book is truly powerful. The criminal investigation turns out to be directly related to the events in Lisbeth’s horrific past, and the way in which old events are gradually revealed in order to explain how the crimes occurred is very cleverly done, with a stunning, emotionally draining climax.

Sounds like the first installment – not without some outsized flaws and even more outsized virtues.

Meanwhile, over at Reviewing the Evidence I review Johan Theorin’s Echoes of the Dead and Sarah Dudley finds favor with Henning Mankell’s The Pyramid. And the Wheredunnit blog finds Arnaldur Indridason’s Arctic Chill a “compelling police procedural.” Steph Davies (the genius behind the Wheredunnit enterprise) also has this interesting news:

The next Erlendur novel, Harðskafi, promises much. It apparently takes the detective back to his childhood home (see below) deep into his soul and the defining trauma of his youth, the loss of his younger brother. Released in Iceland in 2007, it is due to be published in English in the Autumn of 2009 under the provisional title Hypothermia.

Exotic?

I guess it all depends on your perspective. Scandinavian crime fiction to me seems very solid, down-to-earth, and insightful about the everyday. But at least Joan Smith of the Times (London) thinks they’re good. In a round-up of five crime fiction novels set outside the UK, she includes Arnaldur Indridason, Henning Mankell, and Hakan Nesser. A sampling:

Iceland is famous for stunning scenery, collapsing banks and now a world-class crime writer called Arnaldur Indridason. His novels feature a detective who rivals Henning Mankell’s Inspector Wallander when it comes to gloomy introspection, but his plots and layering of past and present are hauntingly original. . . .

. . . The idea behind this collection of Wallander stories is brilliant but simple: it consists of Wallander’s earliest cases, beginning with a period in his life when he was still in uniform. . . . As well as filling in gaps in Wallander’s biography, the book reveals Mankell’s sense that something has gone wrong in Sweden’s model social democracy and identifies some of the causes of the malaise. . . .

The Mind’s Eye by Hakan Nesser (Macmillan £16.99, translated by Laurie Thompson) is a psychological thriller in a class of its own. . . . This stunning novel by one of Sweden’s foremost crime writers might have been written as a script for Alfred Hitchcock.

Also recommended: Teresa Solana’s A Not So Perfect Crime, Catherine Sampson’s The Slaughter Pavilion, Aly Monroe’s The Maze of Cadiz, and PJ Brooke’s Blood Wedding.

Wait, that’s more than five. So maybe five are exotic and . . . well, never mind. They all sound worth reading.

Uriah on Arctic Chill

Arnaldur Indridason gets another nod over at Crime Scraps – in a review that includes some commentary on the current economic meltdown that has destroyed Iceland’s go-go financial markets.

It reminds me that, two years ago when I spoke to the author, he commented that until recently Iceland was a very poor country. The new wealth was causing some upheaval in the culture, with more urbanization and the risk that the Icelandic language and traditions might get diluted as the island nation’s isolation ended. (Erlendur’s preference for traditional Icelandic cuisine and irritation when the language is misused is a kind of protest against change.) When I asked Arnaldur what accounted for the new wealth, he said it was had to do with banking, but that nobody really knew what it was all about or how it made so much money. Apparently neither did the bankers!

Uriah comments -

If Iceland’s banking system and financiers have proved unreliable, that cannot be said for their crime writers.

I have just finished reading Arnaldur Indridason’s  police procedural Arctic Chill in which Erlendur, Sigurdur Oli and Elinborg investigate the death of a young Thai-Icelandic boy, whose Thai half brother has gone missing.

This superb novel gives us an account of the investigation while identifying the tensions that exist  between new immigrants from Asia and the small Icelandic indigenous population. Many of the Icelanders feel that their culture will be destroyed by the incomers who themselves find it hard to cope with the language and the harsh weather. Other issues are introduced with the possible presence in the vicinity of a paedophile, marital infidelity,  and the death of Erlendur’s old boss Marion Briem. . . .

This is crime fiction at its best . . .

Oh, go ahead – read the whole thing. And then place your order for Arctic Chill. I’m particularly interested in comparing its themes with those in Karin Fossum’s The Indian Bride, which I’m finally reading.

chilly reception

Maxine Clark has high praise for Arnaldur Indridason’s Arctic Chill.

Is there such a thing as a perfect crime-fiction novel? Probably not, but if there were, this would surely be a strong contender. Arnaldur Indridason’s latest novel in the Inspector Erlendur series continues the upward trend in quality, confidence and storytelling that I have come to hope for, even dare to expect, with each new outing.

Meanwhile, the Icelandic film of Jar City is getting warm reviews in the UK. Uriah calls it “superb cinema with atmospheric Icelandic choir music, beautiful cinematography of the bleak scenery and compelling acting.” Those attending Bouchercon in Baltimore have a treat in store – Jar City will be getting a screening there.

Michiko Kakutani, a reviewer for The New York Times has a chillier reception for The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. While she loves the lead detective team – “but their peculiar chemistry is what fuels this novel, particularly as Mr. Larsson loses control of his messy, increasingly implausible plot.” She goes on to say:

In fact, it’s clear as the story progresses that Mr. Larsson has no idea how to create a credible villain, for the two people most responsible for Harriet’s disappearance turn out to be patched-together bad guys with none of the malevolent originality of Thomas Harris’s Hannibal Lecter or the manipulative perversion of Catherine Tramell in “Basic Instinct.”

It’s the detectives who are the stars of “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo,” and the reader can only hope that Salander and Blomkvist put in return appearances in the two other novels Mr. Larsson completed before his death.

irresistible

Journalist and critic Michael Carlson locks onto a number of “irresistible targets” in his blog of that name. Recently he reviewed Arnaldur Indridason’s Arctic Chill, the latest of the Erlender series to be translated into English. He noticed an interesting parallel to Jar City – both books are about the isolation of Iceland and its homogenous genetic pool, and even more about the isolation between individuals, even close family members. In this book, the murder victim is a mixed-race child whose mother is a Thai woman brought to Iceland by a man who needs a wife. (Hmm…. that reminds me of Karin Fossum’s The Indian Bride, another book on my enormously long to-be-read list.)

Carlson also recently reviewed John Theorin’s Echoes of the Dead at Crime Time and at his blog recounts his visit to its setting with his small son – he has family living on the island where the book is set. Evidently, the book does justice to the landscape.

I hadn’t often been there before in summer, when it is lovely, but usually in winter or thereabouts, when the ‘alvar’, the inland steppe or plain, is bleak and deserted, the way Theorin uses it to create an atmospheric setting for his slow-building suspense, a story of history and loss.

The theme is the search for a long-missing child, and just thinking about that summer made the book all that much more real to me…the Oland I know may never seem quite the same. But I recommend the book, and Oland, highly.

I owe thanks to Michael for pointing out a Danish author who was missing from my website, Anders Bodelsen -  Mange tak!

more reviews . . .

Dick Adler of the Trib is impressed by The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, now that it’s finally reached the US market. In the UK, lucky Brits get to read Arnaldur Indridason’s latest Erlenedur novel, Arctic Chill, and The Telegraph recommends that they do.

Margaret Cannon of The Globe and Mail thinks Asa Larsson’s The Black Path is well worth following, but Richard Lipez of the Washington Post thinks it meanders too much.

And finally – OffMyTrolley thinks Karin Fossum’s Black Seconds is first rate.