Detective Alex Rechte remembers well the case he had of a missing girl a couple of years earlier, so when a dismembered young woman’s body is found, he realizes right away who it is. As the site is excavated, another body is unearthed; this one a man that has been buried for a much longer time, decades in fact, and then another body is unearthed.
Investigative Analyst Fredrika Bergman is assigned the task of looking into the young woman’s life and finds that she has been researching a children’s author, Thea Aldrin, who was convicted of murdering her partner and suspected of foul play with her missing teenage son. Aldrin seems to have some sort of association to all of the bodies, but she is mute and cannot help. Bergman disturbingly also finds her own partner’s name among the young woman’s effects, but things have been strained between them so she is reluctant to pursue it.
Rechte is a recent widow, and work is his salvation as he becomes obsessed with the case. The third member of the team, Detective Peter Rydh, recently reconciled with his wife, and has her support as he delves into the murders that threaten to consume them all. This is a complicated yet fast moving story, and the detectives all find themselves with personal connections to the case that eventually involve an internal investigation.
Ohlsson excels at creating multi-layered stories with three dimensional, substantive characters, and she does it brilliantly here; the intertwining storylines culminate with a shocking ending. Scandinavian crime fiction fans should be enthralled.
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4/14 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch
THE DISAPPEARED by Kristina Ohlsson. Atria/Emily Bestler Books (March 4, 2014). ISBN 978-1476734002. 416p.
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