Very enjoyable Swedish mystery - wonderful characters and an interesting plot with great twists and turnsI read my first Åke Edwardson book, Death Angels, a couple of weeks ago, and while I loved the characters and thought the plot was well-done, the delivery of it all and conclusion/explanation definitely fell short for me. That book is in the first in Edwardson's Inspector Erik Winter series, and since there were so many things I liked about it, I decided to try the second one before making my mind up about the author.Verdict: I'm so glad that I did! The Shadow Woman had all the positives of Death Angels - great mystery and wonderful characters - while missing the negatives - feeling completely out of the loop and an abrupt ending. Winter is wonderful and I loved him just as much as I did before; his team appears again in this book and is just as well-written. I am predicting a romance between two of the characters and keeping my fingers crossed that it happens, because it would definitely be an "opposites attract" situation.Best of all, of course, is that the mystery is actually a good one! One of my Goodreads updates halfway through was: "This book might have an amazing and mind-bending plot ... I'm still too confused to be sure." Having now finished the book, I can happily tell you that it did indeed have some terrific twists and turns - some that I started to guess towards the end and others that caught me *completely* off guard! Edwardson makes the reader just confused enough to make it interesting and keep you guessing, while leaving enough hints to make you eager to read on and see if what you're piecing together might be right. As with Death Angels we're given different POVs throughout the book, though Winter's is the main one. This includes the victim(s)' and perpetrator(s)', though these are obviously quite obscure and don't always make sense when you read them, gaining new meaning as you get further in the story.I do have to say that I am still not completely sure I understand why the female victim did what she did when she did it (I'm referring to the actions that precipitate her death), but I have a feeling that may be something in terms of detail that was lost in translation. It is laid out for us, but I was nonetheless left with a few questions.Having developed a little reader's crush on Winter and not being completely in love with his girlfriend, the only thing that's keeping me from wanting to read the other books is that I know from summaries that their relationship gets increasingly serious. When we start the series, Winter is dating Angela, yet still getting postcards from other girlfriends and considering sleeping with other women. We rarely see her and when we do, it almost always involves them having sex and sometimes includes a minor conversation, so I think it's no wonder that I don't really feel a connection with her. She's somewhat of a flat character and slightly boring.Winter's sister and parents have roughly the same on-page time as Angela, however they all come off as three-dimensional characters. There's a tension between Winter and his father that is as-yet unexplained, though we're getting more info with each successive book.On to the next in the series!Chief Inspector Erik Winter Series(As of May 2011, only books 1-5 have been translated into English)Book 1 - Death AngelsBook 2 - The Shadow WomanBook 3 - Sun and ShadowBook 4 - Never EndBook 5 - Frozen TracksBook 6 - Segel aus SteinBook 7 - Zimmer Nr. 10.Book 8 - Vänaste landBook 9 - Nästan död manBook 10 - Den sista vinternNOTE: I do think this is one of those series that doesn't have to be read in order, but is more enjoyable if you do.
Rather than the publisher's blurb-description above, (which seems to want to dial up some tabloid-style racial violence to splash on the book's back cover), Åke Edwardson's mystery is more about detection in and of itself. The ways the investigators may use to investigate, and the way crime gets brought to light. Which is kind of a shame. First, obviously, for the reader who just wants some sensational race-baiting conflict, but also for those who might actually be after what's present in the real novel itself. "Simmering with ethnic discord" ..? Well, no, not so much. A little, maybe, as there are some tremors of racial intolerance in the book. But there is probably as much about the weather as there is about ethnic discord. (Maybe this is one of those national-border things, where the home country's edition is truthfully described, but anything goes once it's a foreign edition. Out of sight, out of mind, now with tabloid additives.)The book itself uses classic, tight Police Procedural methods in the early chapters; a nearly perfect mystery in structural terms is laid out very carefully, at first. The main conflict in the story begins to emerge only halfway through, as we witness the clockwork mechanism of the investigators ticking through its paces. What begins to gain hold is the opposite of the 'procedural' methods-- that flash of the old Holmesian inspiration, which defies logic in the clockwork sense of police work, but nudges the investigator toward glimpses of a new understanding. It is maybe the very clinical strictness of the early going that offers the reader a shock, a moment of double-take, when the detective takes the occasional unforeseen left turn in his quest. What was once an admirable tenacity in sticking to procedure becomes a wild goose chase, at least to the outside observer; the story is constructed well enought that the reader knows otherwise. There is a problem that is general to most mysteries, and that is with Plausibility; it is no better than 50/50 that readers will be able to accept the average detective's leaps of imagination. The Holmes model was an excercise in straining that acceptance to the last, unravelling thread. Åke Edwardson's model is different, first setting up narrow definitions for the narrative that must somehow confront the more chaotic, intuitive approach, as he arranges to bring it in. And it's not without humor: "It's often been shown that the choice of location is not random. A murderer selects his spot.""I agree with you. I think.""We have to ask ourselves why she was put there. Why she was lying at Delsjö Lake. Then, why at that particular end of the lake--" "Proximity to the road," Beier interjected. "Maybe. Then we have to ask ourselves why she was lying exactly in that spot. Not five yards this way or that.""You really go in for the mise-en-scène.""The mise-en-scène involves movement; it's the opposite of standing still.""That was beautifully put," Beier said. Good characters, well rendered atmosphere, and no tabloid content. Very near to four stars. I'll be looking for other titles from Mr. Edwardson; as good as he is here with the continuing-detective, I hope he does stand-alone titles, which are generally a much better test of the author's talents.
What do You think about The Shadow Woman (2010)?
I haven’t been reading Åke Edwardson’s Erik Winter mysteries in order, making the private lives of the recurring characters a little difficult to follow. The books keep my interest and provide complex puzzles, but I still don’t feel like I get much insight into the personalities of the main characters. The slower pace of Edwardson’s police procedurals is probably more realistic than the speed with which crimes are usually solved in fiction, but the author’s ability to effectively build suspense is also affected by this pace.See my complete review here:http://whatmeread.wordpress.com/tag/t...
—Kay Robart
I really loved this story - more than I did the first book I read by this author.Erik Winter is the main character and lead detective. In this story a woman is found murdered in a lakeside ditch - thereby ending Erik Winters vacation. The police cannot find out who the murdered woman is - no one comes forward to claim her. They do know that she has a child thoughAt the same time Eriks fellow detective, Aneta,is attacked and sent to the hospital. A big celebration is occurring in the town and people are drinking - and their are bikers getting out of handThe story held my interest and I have ordered the next in the series
—Linda Branham Greenwell
This is the second book in Inspector Eric Winter's series, and it was just as compelling as the first one. A woman is murdered and her identity is unknown. No one claims to recognize her, and it is as if she had never existed. What I find so intriguing about Ake Edwardson's books is the way he foreshadows the action by going into the victims' heads before (and sometimes during) the crime is committed. We feel the victims' fear and anxiety, but we are not sure exactly what is happening to them. Edwardson goes into everyone's thoughts in his books, and that serves to round out all the characters--even the most minor of them. It's fascinating to know what everyone thinks of everyone else and to be privy to knowledge that other characters do not possess.
—Dorrie
