What do You think about Unseen (2006)?
Review via Crime Beat by N. P. Statham. Killers are made, not born. In Unseen, Mari Jungstedt explores the psyche of a killer. What is it that makes a seemingly normal person commit unspeakable acts of violence?In the tradition of the best European crime writers, Unseens opens with a gruesome murder scene. A young woman and her faithful watchdog are killed in a foggy morning, on a deserted beach in Gotland. The body is found nude, with several cuts and wounds. But the most appalling touch is the pair of panties stuffed on the victim's mouth.Soon the police is alerted and not long after the media is on the case. The brutal and sensational murder creates panic among the population in Gotland, who are both in fear for their lives, and also concerned that the upcoming tourist season might be ruined.The investigative team under Inspector Anders Knutas is under pressure to find the killer before the tourist season starts in earnest, and in the meantime more bodies keep piling up. But is there a connection between the victims? And what's the meaning of the panties?Unseen is the first book from Mari Jungstedt I've read, and it's a solid example of the psychological mystery so characteristic of European writers. At the same time that our characters fight to solve the crime at hand, they also must face their own inner demons and conflicts, which can be just as engaging and dramatic.The setting in the beautiful and idyllic holiday island of Gotland gives this procedural novel a touch of the cozy mystery. We're guided through a series of tightly interwoven lives and dramatic backgrounds while slowly unravelling the underlying plot under the gentle but firm guiding hand of the writer.An added bonus for me was reading about so many familiar locations in my own adopted homeland of Gotland, which Mari Jungstedt describes to perfection, from the foggy mornings, to the beauty of the historical town and the windy evenings.If you appreciate a slow paced mystery and psychological drama, I recommend Unseen, by Mari Jungstedt.
—N.P. Statham
Petit voyage vers les contrées nordiques. Ce polar made in Suède nous propose un nouveau commissaire, Anders Knutas, que l'on va certainement retrouver dans d'autres enquêtes. Résumé : Après s'être disputée avec son compagnon lors d'une fête dans leur maison de campagne, Helena Hillerström sort promener son chien le long de la plage. Bientôt, cernée par un épais brouillard, elle sent qu'on la suit. Quelques heures plus tard, elle est retrouvée morte, tuée à coups de hache. Frida Lindh, une jeune mère de trois enfants, quitte le bar où ses amies et elle se rencontrent régulièrement. Malgré la nuit et les quelques verres de vin qu'elle a bus, elle prend son vélo pour rentrer à la maison. Les rues sont désertes. Elle est seule. Non. Pas seule. Une ombre la suit. Celui qu'on ne voit pas. Le commissaire Anders Knutas et son équipe mènent une longue et difficile enquête sous la pression des médias. Quel est le lien entre ces deux jeunes femmes ? Knutas doit au plus vite découvrir le mobile du meurtrier avant que celui-ci ne frappe de nouveau. Et j'en pense quoi?:Avec la série Millenium, j'ai découvert le polar suédois (pardon pour les prédécesseurs que je vais tenter de découvrir aussi). Mari Jungstedt propose un roman dont le style est assez agréable à lire. Découpé selon les jours couverts par l'histoire, l'histoire connaît pas mal de rebondissements et le suspense est maintenu jusqu'au bout. L'auteur donne à voir un coin de Suède en période pré-estivale, une description qui donne envie de faire le voyage. L'histoire n'est pas vraiment originale, l'intrigue n'est pas vraiment tordue. Je n'ai pas été "bousculée" dans ma lecture, mais j'ai passé un agréable moment. Il se lit assez vite et je n'ai pas été déçue de ma lecture quand je suis arrivée à la fin. L'auteur sait donner envie de revenir vers la suite des aventures de Knutas.
—Valeriane
I always look forward to starting a new mystery series, but in this case my anticipation was followed by a tangible let-down. A central problem is I found Inspector Anders Knutas colorless and a character I am not interested in experiencing again. That's unusual in Scandinavian mysteries, where the police presence is usually depressed and dyspeptic, and I found myself missing that approach here.The plot frequently annoyed me. Rather than tracing procedural steps where the perpetrator gradually comes into view, I felt toyed with by frequent red herrings and coincidences which seemed contrived, and the story has an ending which one cannot guess in advance. And some of my neutral response to this book is just personal preference. I dislike excessive violence, stalking and psychopathic predators, and this book has all three.The characters here are almost all difficult to like. Almost all come from dysfunctional families, mostly financially well-off. There is an atmosphere of ennui and marital infidelity with a distressing casualness. I got bored with Jungstedt's obsession with physical attractiveness (for both women and men), and her tendency to have her characters pee with surprising frequency.It's difficult to judge the quality of writing for a book read in translation, but the prose here seems bland and flat, generally simple and style-less. But I suppose this is not exactly a bad book, and can imagine that people who enjoy thrillers will like it more than people thinking they have purchased a police procedural. It just was not very much to my taste.
—William
