(photo: wikimedia.org)
By Jo Nesbo–Having written about Scandinavia’s crimewave—in fiction—when I needed another book in Ottawa, I picked up Jo Nesbo’s The Bat, the first-written in his series of thrillers featuring Oslo detective Harry Hole (Harry emphasizes his name is pronounced Hoo-ley, not Hole). This book was published (at least in the U.S.) after many others in the series, and Booklist deemed it “an absolute must for devotees of the riveting train wreck that is Harry Hole.”
Oddly, the story takes place in Australia, where Harry has been sent to aid the Sydney police investigating the death of a young Norwegian woman. (The Aussies pronounce his name “Holy.”) Lots of effective humor survived translation.
The characters were nicely developed and Harry has obvious deep issues, one of which is staying on the wagon. My only problem was the plot. If you’re chasing a serial killer of beautiful young women with light hair, would you suggest your new girlfriend as bait? “It’s all right, we’ll be right behind you”? How many ways can that go wrong? And, of course, does. Some heavy-handed foreshadowing, as well. Still, though, Nesbo is so popular, he must have got his feet under him as the series developed. (It was Nesbo who was picked to rewrite Macbeth in an ongoing “Shakespeare reimagined” project.)
Here’s a juicy bit: “Was Evans White as tough as he was trying to make out, or was he suffering from deficient mental faculties? Or an inadequately developed soul, a typically Norwegian concept? Harry wondered. Did courts anywhere else in the world judge the quality of a soul?”
