The Scandinoir bandwagon is now a rustbucket. ‘Over 10 million books sold world wide’. Ten million suckers then. Big print, double spaced, short changed. Sorry, but.
Okay. Four pensioners celebrate a modest lottery win. Next morning, one is found dead in his bed. Was it his wife, or one of the winners, looking to increase the share-out? When another of the four goes missing – and so on.
A puff from the Sunday Telegraph tells me that Inspector Van Veeteren is ‘among the great Swedish detectives’; that he is ‘quirky and engaging.’ So why do we wait until page 205 till he makes an appearance? And then see little of him thereafter? He runs an antiquarian bookshop, rolls his own and can still get it up at fifty eight (cheers) – and that’s what makes him a ‘terrific character’? I suppose he has been suspended in one of the five previous tomes in this series, probably for sailing too close to the wind, but honestly, I can’t be bothered to find out.
The rest of the squad aren’t much livelier. The dialogue is flavourless. There’s one – married – who fancies a colleague. That’s to try and make you buy the next one. The rest are a hard-to-tell-apart, dozy bunch of non-descripts and incompetent with it.
We Mean Street-walkers know a thing or two about police competence. We have also picked up a bit about spatter. Twenty eight stab wounds and not a trace on the the perp? When the second victim is dismembered, the bathroom is spotless. Where’s the blue light thingie from CSI when you need it? I suspect that this lot have mislaid the operating manual.
Nor are we impressed when the investigators forget to inform the deceased’s readily available relatives of his demise. When a witness living on a barge reached by a slippery drawbridge over deep water disappears, we would have called in the frogmen a good two hundred pages before it occurs to this dozy crew. When we learn – near the beginning – that one of the victim’s offspring is mured up in a remote asylum, we would be in there like the clappers – and out of here sooner, because that of course is where the dark secret lies hidden, and you won’t have any difficulty guessing what it is.
If I haven’t put you off yet, don’t read on, because here comes what might be called a spoiler, if there was anything here to spoil. How is it that child abuse has become the default option? This isn’t just lazy; it clouds the issue. I don’t just mean that it trivialises a dark and nasty corner of the human psyche. It presents the uncovering of abuse as the solution, the resolution, the last word; end of story, job done. When we know that it isn’t.
Oh – and the weather’s awful. Unlucky lottery? More like the short straw.
I agree that there are some newly written/translated Scandinavian (mainly Swedish) crime novels that seem to be “cashing in on a trend” rather than being any good, examples that have been discussed include Lars Kepler’s The Hypnotist and Hans Koppel’s She’s Never Coming Back. I think it is unfair to characterise Nesser in this regard, though, as his books were published in Sweden 20 years ago or more, and are belatedly being translated now. I think it is not surprising that some themes that are more familar to us now, and have been discussed in more depth, were less usual then. I think it is only fair to judge this book alongside typical police procedurals being written contempraneously with it.
Thanks for this, Maxine. You’ve raised a really interesting question here, and you’re obviously very knowledgeable. Perhaps I should have checked put the original publication date: 1998. But this adds another dimension to out general scepticism about publishing today. Here’s a novel that is out of date, being translated and issued as if it were part of a ‘now’ movement. So it may be good for Nesser’s royalties, and good luck to him, but we are being asked to read it in the context of today, and I don’t think it measures up.
Have you see the film Searching for Sugarman? It raises some similar questions about fame coming years after the original publication. Context does matter. But in the case of this novel, I think a context has been artificially contrived.
So, we should clear bookshop shelves of George Pelecanos’s The Sweet Forever (1998), Dennis Lehane’s Gone Baby Gone (1998) and Elmore Leonard’s Rum Punch (1998) in case someone mistakes them for contemporary crime fiction?
Nesser is well known and respected, though English translations have lagged behind, say, German. I do agree that it’s frustrating when a publisher brings something out and treats it as the latest thing, and yes, there is a new acceptance of the notion translated fiction is actually acceptable to English-speaking audiences which has led to a lot of stuff being on the market.. I haven’t read this book, so don’t know if I would agree with you or not, but I think you are incorrect to suggest that Nesser is an incompetent writer. Also – best avoid reading anything by Fred Vargas, though she has repeatedly won awards. I don’t think you’d enjoy her lack of CSI-style police procedure.
Clear the shelves? No, of course not. Some things last and some things don’t. And some – over time – become interesting precisely because they are dated. I’ve recently read AA Milne’s sole effort at crime. It isn’t brilliant, but the period flavour – which Milne probably wasn’t aware of at the time; how could he be? – is fascinating. Likewise a re-issue of Modesty Blaise.
But I found this novel flavourless and lazy. Perhaps he has written better. I hope his reputation isn’t just based on a marketing division’s hype. Could be too that this is a poor translation. One of Mankell’s translators does a lousy job. Still, glad to have stirred up a bit of controversy.
Thanks for the response. Just to note that the first Nesser to be translated, Borkmann’s Point (#4), was translated a few years ago by Macmillan, before (for example) the Stieg Larsson trilogy, so before the major hype began. Macmillan has been publishing one a year since then (as it takes a while for Laurie Taylor to write the translation, so can’t be quicker, presumably) – I think they are now up to #8 of the 10. So while I agree with you that there is cashing in, etc, going on, I don’t think it is correct to accuse this particular author/publisher of so doing.
That having been said, I agree that this book is not the best introduction to Nesser. If you ever want to read him again, the first in the series is The Mind’s Eye and is one I enjoyed more than some of the others. The author (whom I’ve heard talk a couple of times) takes a particular crime-fiction standard plot in each book, and writes his own take on it. The Unlucky Lottery is about the McGuffin (false clue, much beloved by Alfred Hitchcock), not one of my own favourite devices.
BTW if you are interested in my recommendation for Swedish crime fiction, I am very keen on Liza Marklund (series about a journalist) and Karin Altvegen, who does not write a series but has written some excellent suspense/thrillers – suggest you might like Missing.
Thanks Maxine. Always glad to try something new and I’ll give Nesser another chance.
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