Anne Holt

The Hanne Wilhelmsen series from Norwegian author Anne Holt is another one of those Scandinavian series that have been translated completely out of order. For reasons which, as usual, escape me completely. So <insert standard whinge about how profoundly annoying that is>, and onto BLIND GODDESS which is the book that started the whole thing off.

It would be bad enough to discover a battered body when jogging in the morning, but you'd doubt lawyer Karen Borg would also have been expecting to be called in as defence counsel for the Dutchman who is found wandering, dazed, covered in the victim's blood. Not only is Borg a witness, she's never heard of her new client, and she's not a criminal lawyer. For some reason the suspect will talk to nobody else.

What connection there is between a seeming drug deal gone wrong and the shooting death of a shady lawyer a few days later is equally unclear. Just to complicate the issue even more the Police Attorney assigned to the case is an old friend, would-be suitor of Karen Borg's who has partnered with Hanne Wilhelmsen to solve the crime. Wilhelmsen's motivation as always is to be a good cop, his is slightly less clear.

Needless to say this is a complex, enthralling plot which has all the elements you want for high intrigue. There's mysterious numeric codes, there's questions to be answered in both the legal and policing hierarchy, and there's the complications of personal connection weaving around all of the characters.

Even though this is a very good plot, the bit that really grabbed my attention is the building of the characters. If you've been suckered into reading the two books out of order, this is a very different Wilhelmsen from that in 1222. She's an interesting person, a dedicated and serious policewoman who will turn rule breaker when rules need to be broken. Likewise the Police Attorney, Hakon Sand plays an important part in the story, and the way he tries to balance his attraction for Borg with the responsibilities of the investigation is actually quite touching.

I was one of the people that liked the first translated book (actually the eighth in the series) 1222, although I will admit there's a thread within that book, leading to one of the more ridiculous conclusions I've ever come across (I just ignored all of that completely!). But I always did wonder about Wilhelmsen's background. No is the short answer, so if you had reservations about 1222 I'd suggest you come back to the start as well. See if you can get a connection with this series from where it's all supposed to kick off.

Take one gloriously grumpy central protagonist, add that train crash, include a massive snowstorm cutting off a train full of people 1222 metres above sea level in an inaccessible hotel, add a mysterious locked carriage and a group of shadowy unknown passengers, then kill off a high-profile passenger and see what happens.

What happens is that our grumpy protagonist, Hanne Wilhemlsen, ex-police officer, in a wheelchair as a result of being shot on duty, has to work out what is going on before the body count continues to increase.  With no official help from the outside, and way too much interfering help on the inside, Hanne and a small group of trusted people - some passengers, some staff, some locals, need to work out who wanted to kill off a seemingly harmless, albeit annoying, priest.  And the killing doesn't stop there.

Of course this plot has more than a hat-tip to a few perennial favourite devices - a closed room setting, albeit a biggish closed room in this example.  This is a very large, rather luxurious resort, capable of taking in 269 or so people at a moment's notice.  Then there's the idea of the thinking, observational detective - in this case enforced because of physical restrictions, there's something vaguely reminiscent of Nero Wolfe or Hercule Poriot about Hanne, although her Archie / Hastings is embodied in more than one person in 1222.  

There is a large potential cast of passengers, staff and local helpers so it's just possible that the concept of a resort (that's further divided after a particular storm event) could be what makes the action being centred around a very small group of people feasible.  Despite this, there was more than one point where I did wonder where everybody else was hiding - 269 plus people not being a small number after all.  Add to that the secretive sub-thread about the mysterious closed off carriage, and you couldn't help wondering what was going on behind closed doors, besides the murder plotting of course!

That secretive sub-thread is probably the only part of the book that simply flat-out, doesn't work.  This reader had to assume that perhaps the closed carriage was there as a bit of a hap-tip to the classic red-herring (being another perennial favourite), but to be honest, it didn't work as a red-herring throughout the book and the resolution... well it was just pointless.

Ignoring that bit of off-kilter action, the rest of the book was really good.  I really like Hanne (and not just because I like grumpy protagonists!), and the use of the setting to provide a closed off, claustrophobic environment along with a sense of potential threat worked.  There was a good cast of supporting characters, some nice touches of humour and good pace, and for readers who like to work out the whodonnit aspects, the author has played pretty fair - you've got a good chance of sorting it out, although you will be waiting until the last minute to get your deductions confirmed.

After a bit of a look around it seems that, in that delightful habit publishers have designed to drive readers mildly bats, 1222 is the eighth Hanne Wilhelmsen novel, but the first to be translated into English.  Hopefully we'll get the rest of the series "toots sweet".  In the right order would be greatly appreciated.