Customer Reviews

The Cruel Stars of the Night: A Mystery

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When a book is translated into English from another language, often the transition can be easily seen. That happens when the translator can't quite get the tone of the original language, and thus makes the English version stilted. This book, howevber, has an excellent translator, and if you were unaware that it was originally written in Swedish, you would swear the author wrote in English.

This is the second book in the police procedural series about Ann Lindell, a female detective in the Swedish town of Uppsala. In this book, a series of seemingly random murders of elderly men takes place, and Lindell and her colleagues are attempting to find out what and why they happened, and to these men in particular. Initially it seems that they may be random killings, but as the story goes on it appears that there may be some reason, however odd, behind the murders.

As usual with this series, the writing is extremely well done, and the descriptive sentences flow easily across the page. We get to intermingle with Lindell and her associates on a somewhat intimate basis, and for a time it appears that the thread of the plot has been lost. That's not the case; it's just been under the surface, seething and getting ready to come alive again.

There is real danger to Lindell in this story, and the tension regarding her situation increases almost with every page near the end of the book. I found the ending a bit inconclusive, but it did not detract from the overall excellence of the book. I look forward eagerly to the next book in this series!

Petrus Blomgren had written a suicide note, but he was murdered before he could kill himself. The Uppsala Violent Crimes detectives begin looking for the killer. Soon there are two more similar murders of elderly men. Laura Hindersten reports her father missing. There appears to be nothing to link the victims together, there's little the police can do except to check and recheck every clue and every person they can find who knew the victims. The reader, as well as the various detectives, is left to try to fit the puzzle pieces together.

In some ways, this novel is frustrating with so many clues, so many detectives, so many victims, relatives, and interrelationships. But quickly, you become absorbed in the lives of the people involved. Laura Hindersten's father was a tyrant and now without him she's tasting freedom but years of repressed anger snaps out as we watch her spiral into insanity -- or so it seems. Stig Franklin, attracted to Laura, weighs the dangers of an affair against his bland relationship with Jessica. Ann Lindell accepts a date with another officer and begins to think perhaps the time has come to look beyond herself and her son. Each character is fully developed and while we may not get a chapter viewpoint into their life when they appear on the page it's obvious that they have a life off screen and this is just the intersection with the reader.

The tempo is slow and methodical throughout the investigation. The various threads circle and touch until they begin to weave through each other creating or adding to other threads that finally lead us to the solution. If you want pulse pounding action you get it in the last couple of chapters but otherwise it's a slow steady accumulation of people, snippets of lives affected by the death of a neighbor, a friend, or a family member. It's a book you can lose yourself in. The conclusion is satisfying -- the police identify the culprit but we don't tie up every end neatly and you're left wondering what happens to these people after you close the book and put it on the shelf.

Laura Hindersten's professor father has gone missing and, while he may have just took off without telling her (though tyrannical, he is exceptionally eccentric), she is convinced something horrible has happened to him.

The members of the Uppsala Violent Crime Division are certain the professor - an expert on the Renaissance poet Petrarch - will turn up. But they are much more concerned with the murders of several elderly men in the region and how that may affect the upcoming visit by Queen Silvia, scheduled to arrive in a few days to open the new Academic Hospital.

Police Inspector Ann Lindell suspects there may be links between the murders and the missing professor, a hunch born out by evidence presented by the professor's colleague. As the body count and public anxiety increases, there's pressure on Inspector Lindell and the rest of the team to determine if the deaths are the work of a serial killer.

The Cruel Stars of the Night, the sequel to Kjell Eriksson's critically acclaimed debut, The Princess of Burundi, once again features the Uppsala Violent Crime Division and Police Inspector Ann Lindell.

Police procedurals are standard mystery fare, yet Eriksson takes this well-worn formula and crafts something extraordinary. His character-driven mysteries feature an ensemble "cast" and the personality and motivation of each member of the Uppsala Violent Crime Division is fleshed out in tandem with the details of the case. Eriksson's police men and women are very human, each with their own way of balancing work and home. Lindell, a single parent raising a young son, wonders if she is a "good" parent, while coping with loss and loneliness.

This is not an action-filled thriller. Eriksson lets the tension build slowly, playing out the psychological clues like an expert angler - ensuring his audience is hooked before ratcheting up the tension. Readers may be able to takes breaks from Eriksson's work in the early chapters; however, once the pieces begin to fall together, The Cruel Stars of the Night becomes impossible to put down.

Armchair Interviews agrees completely.

I was surprised to learn that this was only Eriksson's second book about Ann Lindell (the chief investigator on the case). The police team characters seemed to have been together for awhile and the author does a great job conveying a sense of a long-standing team working well together. I was looking forward to finding earlier books of the series but I guess I have to be satisfied with there being only one.

I liked the book a lot despite the fact that, to me anyway, there was no mystery of who the killer had to be. The mystery was, why the obvious killer was the killer. It certainly wasn't obvious to the police who, except for Lindell, never made a connection between the old professor's disappearance and the murders of the old men.

I thought the bit with the chess pieces and the potential connection to an assassination attempt on the queen was a total distraction. It might have work better if the author had explained a bit better what the connection was. The old chess match history was interesting but I never did get the connection.

But that was only a minor complaint. On the whole I enjoyed the book quite a lot. I had a hard time putting it down.

The previous book 'The Princess of Burundi' is brilliant, this one not even a shadow of that. Merely contrived, a re-working of 'The Princess ...', a pastiche, what else can I say, too soon, too similar, not a patch on 'The Princess...'. No series in this author judging by this effort. If you pine for Scandinavian crime, go for the 10-book series featuring Martin Beck by Maj Sowall and Per Wahloo - as stunning as this is flat.

there were too many loose ends. what did drs. without borders have to do with anything and what kind of ending was this..... i thought maybe the whole thing did not download.

In Sweden, the Uppsala Violent Crime Division police department struggles with cases that does not make sense as they cannot find a connection though the crimes are similar. Two elderly men are murdered with a third missing. The local police hope to rescue the missing man, retired professor Hindersten although they expect foul play has already occurred.

While officers Ann Lindell, Ola Haver, Sammy Nilsson, and Allan Fredricksson struggle with making progress, the daughter of the missing man, Laura Hindersten begins to crack under this new crisis. Desperate, the cops lean towards a real life chess game with the taking out of Sweden's Queen Silvia being checkmate. However lone wolf Lindell disagrees and tries a different path that could lead to the death of the cop.

The exciting story line rotates between two strong subplots; that of an ensemble police procedural and a psychological thriller. They share in common frustration as the police struggle with a serial killer in which the dots fail to connect while Laura is losing control. As with THE PRINCESS OF BURUNDI, Ann sticks out amongst the police as she goes down a different path than her peers. Kjell Eriksson provides a one sitting clever whodunit.

Harriet Klausner

It's a very good analysis of a full progression to what we call madness, and a nice description of police officers and their procedures. For the reader it's quite easy to tell who is the serial killer, but also is possible to understand that the police has not all the clues. I enjoyed the book.

There is a new light on the horizon!
Those who love an intelligent read and don't feel the need for a bookcover to hide behind will be glad for the entrance of Kjell Erikson to their bookshelves.
His characters are humanly drawn and his plots are careful. These are people we can live with in our own lives---even the bad guys!
I recommend "The Princess of Burundi" as well.
First rate!

This book starts out slowly and continues in the same vein until well into the book. Then it heats up a little bit. Not enough for me. There are so many characters that you lose track. There is a major red herring that only serves to prolong the book -- it doesn't really add anything. Detective Ann Lindell is supposed to be the heroine, I guess, but the way the book is written, she seems more of a minor character. I found the book confusing and unconvincing. This is my first Eriksson book. I'll try one more of his books and then I'll move on.