Customer Reviews

The Dogs of Riga: A Kurt Wallendar Mystery

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(15)
2 star:		(8)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

One of the previous reviewers mentioned that "Dogs of Riga" might be difficult for Americans because of its pervasive 'Scandinavian gloom'. True, I think, but what makes this novel even more unsettling is the thick, murky atmostphere of mistrust and suspicion depicted in the countries of Eastern
Europe in the early 1990's. It is difficult for Americans to empathize with the fear and suspicion of those times, which is the setting of this novel. The repressive and grim background is indeed the leading force in the novel: it is a force which still impacts life in much of the Eastern Bloc today, accompanied by suspicion and corruption.

Against that setting, then, the characters assume heroic proportions. The desire of Wallander to do his job well and bring closure to the deaths, the courage of Major Liepa to confront corruption, and the passion of Baiba Liepa to revenge the murder of her husband--all assume epic dimensions when viewed against the social backdrop. The plot is thickened by the lies, fear, and deceit by which even the ordinary citizen must survive. The labyrinth is constructed with masterful prose and an observant eye, hallmarks of Mankell's craft as a writer.

"Dogs of Riga" is a classic of the genre. More complex and better crafted than the typical police procedural, it is a 'must read' for the epicurean mystery reader.

In THE DOGS OF RIGA-- both four-legged and two-legged--Inspector Kurt Wallander is back with another difficult crime to solve. Two dead men, dressed to the nines, wash ashore in Ystad in a life raft. As usual, initially there are practically no clues. This crime takes Wallander away from Sweden into Latvia, a place he finds colder-- if that's possible-- than his homeland. He warms up, of course, when he falls in love with the widow of another murdered character, Major Liepa of Riga. Inspector Wallander remains the character fans of Mankell have come to love. He doesn't always get along with his father and daughter or his police superiors, he on the best of days bends the rules of conducting an investigation, on other days he breaks them, he doesn't eat well, he has trouble with the opposite sex and he's a tad hypochondriacal but still loves opera. Does he sound like someone you know?

I found myself not liking this novel as much as previous ones I have read by Mr. Mankell. It may have been that he was writing about locales and people very foreign to him. On the other hand, a B novel by this most talented of writers is better than those of dozens of his contemporaries.

As always, Mr. Mankell writes about big issues, in this instance "the revolutionary events that took place in the Baltic countries during the last year" as he says in a rare "Afterword" written in 1992. He remains one of our very best crime writers.

"The Dogs of Riga" is one of the earlier books in Henning Mankell's series about his somber fictional Swedish police Inspector Kurt Wallendar and the plot is darker and jerkier than in later stories. I first read the book when it was published in German in 1993 and it's the only one of the series that I regularly enjoy re-reading. There's nothing slick about the story telling: it has a very raw edge to it.

The story follows the traditional Wallendar plotline: an exotic foreigner arrives in the peaceful coastal town of Ystad, accompanied by a slew of violent acts and connections to powerful people that shock the overworked local police force. In this case, the foreign dogs who wash up on Sweden's shore are two very dead businessmen with drugs in their systems.

Wallendar follows the trail back across the Baltic Sea to Riga, the capital of newly independent Latvia. There he involves himself more in local "affairs" than is politic or safe. Mankell kicked up some dust with this book. The Latvia described is a chaotic mix of gangland crime and corrupt officialdom. Some Latvians took exception to that bleak picture. (Latvia became independent in 1991 and "Hundarna i Riga" was published the following year.)

Kommissar Wallendar is often compared to Georges Simenon's Inspecteur Maigret or Colin Dexter's Chief Inspector Morse. In this book, he also shows traces of John Le Carré's Smiley. Mankell has been extremely popular in Europe for a long time. Maybe his books are better read in a cold, damp climate like that of Sweden, but I can't see anything that makes them "difficult for some American readers" as Publishers Weekly advises.

In this the second book by Henning Mankell, the setting starts in Sweden but then moves to Latvia just as this country is breaking its bonds with Mother Russia. Mankell attempts to bring the reader into the depths of despair of the newly forming Latvia, but he does not quite execute.

The story starts with a life raft carrying two murdered Eastern Europeans landing (with some help) on the shores of Sweden. It is a very slow and uninspiring first 100 pages. The characters are paper thin and the story just doesn't beg the reader's empathy. As the story moves to Latvia, the plot thickens and picks up dramatically as Mankell seems to be on top of his writing as this second phase of the story unfolds. Detective Wallander is asked to come to Latvia to continue the investigation that was begun in Sweden. The writing turns to a "Le Carre-like" spy story and the reader is treated to a myriad of protagonists and possible suspects. The reader is immersed into the "stab in the back" Russian sympathizers and their own anti-revolution sentiments.

However, the last 100 pages revert back to lame writing and a story that just does not want to end. This reader can see the potential building in this author, but in this novel, Mankell oversteps his comfort zone too much. He fails to bring the reader with him throughout the book and turns a promising premise into a somewhat boring effort by simply failing to edit the last 100 pages.

I am enjoying reading Mankell knowing that he develops into something special and experiencing this after the fact by reading books written nearly 20 years ago. This one could really be skipped. The initial offering was more interesting, but the sophomore slump hits Mankell in this one.

Novels whose protagonist is inspector Kurt Wallander from a small village of Sweden, contains for me as much sociology and politics as crimes. This books follows a chronological order, so we can see the aging of the personages and the pass of time in the police station of Ystad, South Sweden. That is fully believable, although it seems not likely that in a small village it could happen so many terrible, complicate and strange murders that let New York as a quiet hamlet. Sure, that gives to inspector Wallander the opportunity to demonstrate his high ability and intelligence as policeman, philosopher, etc. We, as readers must accept that literary license.
We see, I spite to have to face terrible criminals Wallander very rarely carries his ordnance handgun. He drives too much his old and re - repaired Peugeot, delegates very little the most routine tasks, earns a low salary, sleeps very bad and very little and he's constantly sick and tired after many journeys of almost 24 hours of hard work. He resists all that by drinking a big amount of coffee, doesn't disdain whisky, eats usually cheap tasteless hamburgers and pizzas, all very fast and very bad and so, he suffers some diarrheas, and he's overweigh and prone to diabetes. Summing up, Kurt Wallander isn't Mike Hammer: he's humane, so humane, that if truly necessary he's able to knock out with a powerful punch to an adversary. He's constantly consternated by the cases he has to solve. He's truly a pacific man and doesn't like his profession but he simply doesn't know another thing to do in life.
And there, it does very well: the reason is Wallander possess an extraordinary sharpened instinct for true or false things and words, a rare ability to relation spare words, declarations apparently unconnected, and a deep knowledge of human being and human situations. That is worth more tahn a revolver. These abilities I think aren't fully innate: you need to have experience of living, looking, and capacity to learning from it. In effect, personal and familiar problems of Swedish society are omnipresent. In this novel Wallander has to solve the murder of two Latvians in a small boat at derive. That goes him to find a love with a Latvian woman. In Spain we have much Swedish and Scandinavian people living here almost permanently with a good standard of life while Russians and Baltic people are economically in poor situation, but the novel reveals truly these Northern people seems very near in character and mood.

In Henning Mankell's "The Dogs of Riga" police inspector Kurt Wallander finds himself alone and possibly in peril in post-Soviet Latvia. He is truly a stranger in a strange land.

The plot of "The Dogs of Riga", the second in Mankell's Kurt Wallander mystery series, is fairly straightforward. Two bodies wash up on the southern coast of Sweden, near the town of Ystad. Police Inspector Kurt Wallander is placed in charge of the investigation. The investigation reveals that the bodies had drifted across the Baltic Sea from the Republic of Latvia. A Latvia police detective arrives to assist Wallander before the investigation is turned over to the Latvian police force. However, Wallander is soon obligated to travel to Riga, Latvia's capital. Wallander is immersed immediately in the Byzantine politics that engulfed Latvia and the Baltic States in the aftermath of the collapse of the Soviet empire. He doesn't speak the language, he knows next to nothing of the political situation he has walked into, and yet plods on, determined to get to the bottom, not of the murders of the two Latvians, but of a new-found Latvian friend and colleague.

Mankell's Kurt Wallander series is often compared to the Martin Beck detective mysteries authored by the husband and wife team of Per Wahloo and Maj Sjowall. Wallander, like Beck, is a police detective in Sweden. Unlike Beck, whose beat was Stockholm, Wallander works in the small southern-Swedish city of Ystad. The Wallander series takes place in the 1990s while the Beck series took place in the 1960s and 1970s. Although I tend to prefer the Beck series, the Wallander books are entertaining page-turners. Mankell stays well within the `police procedural' formula and has not tried to reinvent the genre. However, he has done a good job, in these first two volumes in the series, of developing the character of Mankell and his supporting cast of characters. Wallander is no Sherlock Holmes and gets results more by perspiration than inspiration. He is also a fully drawn character. We see him dealing with the break-up of a marriage, an estranged daughter, and a father who is developing senile dementia. The supporting characters, particularly his fellow detectives, are also well drawn.

Although I think I like the Martin Beck series a bit more, the Kurt Wallander series, so far, has been entertaining. As noted, Mankell stays well within the confines of the police procedural. However, he manages to put together an entertaining plot and keeps the reader `engaged' with his recurring characters. Mankell does not hide clues from the reader. In fact, the opposite is the case. I found myself seeing `clues' throughout this piece wondering if and when Wallander would spot them. Some may find that not to their liking, but it kept me entertained. Recommended. L. Fleisig

Let me begin by pointing out that I am a huge Henning Mankell fan, although I found this book a bit of disappointment. His writing ability is clear, concise and flows so smoothly he can only compare to Ed McBain who also knew how to tell a story in a simple but extremely effective way. The problem with this story is that so much of it involves foreign intrigue that seems out of place for both the writer and the Wallander, the main character, that I am not surprised that Mankell didn't go back to it. I can't praise this author enough, but I would read any of his other Wallander books before reading this. It's not bad, just a disappointment when you consider what he can do.

Riga did indeed feel like that at that time. The author skillfully takes you back to that time and place. The mystery part is not the greatest, but the discription of the nature of the struggle between the good guys and the bad guys is very good. For the mystery I award three stars. I like the short and common Latvian names that Mr. Mankell choose, but the two dead Russians that drifted to Sweden should have more properly been given Latvianized russian names and not the very Latvian names Leja (valley) and Kalns (hill). For mood, setting and background I award five stars. The average is four.

Henning Mankell is undoubtedly the Agatha Christie of Sweden - a very good, competent author of crime and suspense novels. His writing style is sparse, but very effective, and as a suspense novel, this story will grip you and keep you reading until the last page. At least, it kept me glued to the story to the last page. As a history of the events in the Baltic states, especially Latvia, it is not so convincing. Several grievous errors crop up, and it is quite unbelievable that a policeman, even from a small Skåne town, would be so ignorant of the history and situation in the Baltics. Even in the turbulent times of the 1988-1991 'Singing Revolution', There was no question who the ultimate authority was in Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania. To pretend that Latvians had any real say-so in their country is not realistic, even by a Swede. It is true that Sweden was practically the only western country to recognize the incorporation of the Baltic States into the Soviet Union, but it also had a sizeable diaspora of Estonians and Latvians, some of whom moved in fairly high circles of the Swedish government. Any halfway-educated Swede knew the situation across the Baltic Sea. And any Swedish policeman sent to coordinate criminal investigation in the former Soviet Union should, and would have been briefed by the foreign ministry before being allowed to go. So, in reading the book, be enthralled by the mystery, but do not take the history and explanation of the political scene all too seriously.

A rubber boat floats to shore with two dead bodies and Wallander is assigned the case. Who are these men? Who called in the tip to the police that the raft could be found? Just when Wallander seems to be getting nowhere, Latvia sends Major Liepa of the Riga police force to work on the investigation. This case will take Wallander to Latvia and into a politically driven plot with twists and turns as he strives to find the answers to several murders. He encounters a passionate group of Freedom Fighters and begins to understand the political underbelly of Riga and the shadows that rule. It is a dark,dank and dreary world that he finds in Riga. As usual Wallander's emotions rule the day and he throws himself headlong into a dangerous plot to help a group of Latvians discover the truth. This is the second book in the Wallander series and differs significantly in that the social commentary is front and foremost. I felt like Mankell teetered on the edge of melodrama with this one. There was alot of action and unlikely scenario's where Wallander survives by the skin of his teeth. I missed the camaraderie and banter of the Ystad police force. In all though a good mystery but less enjoyable for me than the other books I've read in the series.