I have just devoured the latest three mysteries by Håkan Nesser's, Hour of the wolf (Carambole: 2012), The strangler's honeymoon (Svalan, katten, rosen, döden: 2013) and The weeping girl (2013).
The three mysteries are of great interest to me on multiple levels. First of all, even though they feature Ewa Moreno, and her current chief inspector and team members, the retired Chief Inspector Van Veeteren (VV) is inevitably involved, either through the death of his son, or the seeming suicide of his acquaintance. Unlike many other murder cases which deal more or less with low-life criminals, Nesser's murderers are chiefly professionals and intellectuals held high in esteem in society, such as doctors, businessmen, police offers and university professors.
Secondly Nesser is a great writer in dissecting typical social issues, such as loneliness which has penetrated into traditionally close-knit units, such as family, or police force through the investigation of a body being discovered in a busy apartment for months. He is an equally effective writer in voicing out the fragility of life: a happy family can be destroyed after the death of a father or an infidelity committed by a father (The strangler's honeymoon, and The weeping girl); a successful life can be turned upside down after one accidentally kills without reporting himself to the authorities (Hour of the wolf).
Last but not least, Nesser is anything but a hopeless pessimist. Life goes on: VV has a granddaughter to hold on to after his son's death; VV is waiting for his girl friend to continue a real vacation on the Greek Island after the strangler's suicide; and Moreno is still cherishing the dream for an ideal man to show up.
