Customer Reviews

Murder at the Savoy (A Martin Beck Police Mystery)

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The plot of Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo's "Murder at the Savoy" is simple. Viktor Palmgren is a wealthy Swedish businessman. His business conglomerate includes not only typical legitimate business interests but also some seamy interests that include the ownership of slum housing developments and the possible international sales of arms and munitions to third-world nations. So, when on a warm sunny evening in the Swedish city of Malmo he is gunned down while giving a speech in a hotel restaurant the local police naturally assume the murder was driven by political or corporate interests. So Police Inspector Martin Beck is sent down from Stockholm to lead the investigation.

Published in English in 1971, "Murder at the Savoy" is the 5th of 10 Inspector Beck mysteries written by the husband and wife team of Sjowall and Wahloo. Although I've found the five Beck books I've read (including this one) to be enjoyable I agree with the sense of the other reviews that this is one of their weaker efforts. The tension and the plot and character development that marked some of the earlier books in the series. The story itself is interesting enough and the writing is full of sharp and cynical observations about life in Sweden in the 1960s and 1970s but, ultimately, this book was not as compelling as the others. The story line unfolded in a fairly predictable way and there was nothing along the way that served to heighten the dramatic tension. Even the one attempt at showing a rather intimate encounter between two of the characters came across as routine. By the time the investigation reached the point of revealing the `solution' I was perfectly happy to just nod my head, say "okay" and move on to the next book on my to be read pile.

I do recommend the Martin Beck series to any reader interested in good detective stories. For the most part the series has been very satisfying. For example, The Man on the Balcony, Roseanna, and The Laughing Policeman are all excellent detectice stories. As someone who already knows the main characters and likes the series, Murder at the Savoy was a decent if not totally satisfying read. However, if this book had been my introduction to Inspector Beck I probably would not have picked up the second one. So, by all start with some of the other books in the series. If you like them and then come across Murder at the Savoy it is worth reading to keep up with the development of the series and its characters. I wouldn't recommend it for a one-off book to pick up off the shelf nor would a fan of the series lose any sleep if they gave this one a pass. L. Fleisig

Along with Roseanna and The Man on the Balcony, Murder at the Savoy easily ranks in the top three out of the ten Martin Beck series. Logical, crisp plot. Great references to the political climate of the 60's. A real pleasure.

The eighth Martin Beck novel. For the first time in the series, Sjowall and Wahloo feel like they're treading water. The crime this time is the mysterious murder of a wealthy industrialist at a fancy supper club. The murderer shoots him once in the back of the head at dinner, with thirteen witnesses in attendance, exits through a window, and rides away on his bicycle. But amazingly, Stockholm homicide detective Beck finds the crime virtually unsolvable.

As in some of their previous novels (particularly "The Man who Went Up in Smoke") very little happens during the course of the book, the ending is anticlimactic and the solution to the crime has less to do with police work than dumb luck. However, in their previous novels, the extra space with filled in with the fascinating details of police investigation: false leads, lying witnesses, and bueracratic incompetence. Although those elements are again present in this work, here the focus is on heavy-handed political and social criticism, particularly the evils of capitalism (Sjowall and Wahloo were Marxists.)

Still, the book has its own paticular charm.

This was my second contact with Sjowall and Wahloo's Martin Beck police detective novels, and while I like the taut no-nonsense style of these novels, I think this one falls quite a bit short of Roseanna. In Murder at the Savoy, a wealthy businessman named Palmgren is shot in the head and killed while addressing a group of people at dinner in the elegant Savoy Hotel in Malmo, a Swedish coastal resort town. The killer calmly escapes out the window and leaves the scene on a bicycle, and we learn that nobody at the table got a decent look at the shooter.

Martin Beck is soon brought in from Stockholm, since the case has political repurcussions arising from Palmgren's shady business transactions, including international arms sales. I was a little disappointed in the way the crime was solved, since Beck was ultimately a bit player in the novel, and the interplay between the various Malmo detectives was a little stale since the authors had not given us much background information. I found myself getting confused between "Larsson" and "Kollberg", and not much caring who was who.

As usual with this series, the crimes are solved by thorough detective work, including chasing some leads that go nowhere, without a lot of contrivances in the plot like extended gunplay, strange coincidences or mystical psychic citizens who identify the killer through hypnosis. I am not a detective, but it seems to me these novels give a more accurate account of how crimes are actually solved by municipal detectives. All in all a pretty good read, suspenseful and engaging at times, but not up to the level of the authors' best.

Victor Palmgren, a businessman worth millions, is making a speech to a few associates in the dining room of the Savoy in Malmö. Suddenly a man appears, shoots Palmgren in the back of the head and disappears out an open window.

Palmgren is a heartless money-making machine, and no one mourns him.

Dim-witted policemen in both Malmö and Stockholm get the investigation off to a bad start. Superintendent Martin Beck of the national homicide squad is sent to Malmö to take over. He forms a pleasant partnership with Månsson, the head cop in Malmö whose adventures in a previous book I found quite delightful.

The higher-ups want a quick solution because the killer may have a political agenda. Palmgren was selling weapons illegally to questionable countries.

Sjöwall and Wahlöö also have a political agenda. They portray a society that's breeding poverty, joblessness, crime, drug addiction - and supporting fat cat profiteers like Palmgren. It's interesting to see how Sjöwall and Wahlöö influenced future generations of Swedish crime writers, whose detectives are invariably depressed by the social ills all around them.

This is not my favorite Martin Beck mystery, but I'm glad I read it, if only to keep up with the characters. Now that I'm familiar with Beck and his associates, I always enjoy watching them work - and don't want to miss any happenings in their personal lives.

I learned in the introduction that Sjöwall and Wahlöö called their ten Martin Beck novels The Story of Crime. Reading the books in order, says Arne Dahl, is the best way to appreciate the grand design. I'd recommend reading this one only if you're reading them all, as I am.

In a world full of suspects, with multiple possible scenarios for the cause of The Murder at the Savoy, the ending seemed entirely plausible and all too real. Too many police procedurals lead to improbable endings and a degree of an absence of real life circumstances. These authors create detectives whose task is often tedious and who often find dead ends to plausible theories. The dialogue is crisp and the humor creeps in at the right pace. An entertaining read.

"Murder at the Savoy" is a 1971 crime story and the sixth in the excellent Martin Beck series by the Swedish writing team of Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo. The Savoy of the title is a swank hotel in the southern Swedish city of Malmo, a port city that sits close across the Baltic from Denmark. A wealthy businessman is shot dead in Savoy's posh dining room as he is speaking to a group of family and colleagues. After strolling in and taking his killing shot, the gunman jumps through an open window and escapes. Who was he? Why did he commit the murder? The police investigation of the crime reveals that the businessman and his cronies have been involved in some very sleazy deals that have the potential to embarrass the Swedish political establishment. The intrepid Chief Inspector of the National Homicide Squad, Martin Beck, is dispatched to Malmo to quickly close the case and minimize the political fallout. Beck partners with Per Mansson, and Inspector with the Malmo police force. It turns out that the two are soul mates, in that they have both seen and heard just about every human foible and form of bad behavior in their years as cops and both are weary of incompetent political supervisors.

Authors Sjowall and Wahloo readily indulge their own dissatisfaction with abuse of privilege and perceived lack of social justice of the period and delivery a lively and sardonic story line that carries through to the novel's end. Their message here is the rich and powerful (and criminal) will always come out ahead of the poor and unconnected. Plenty of humor and wit in this story which skewers a variety of character types on the way to resolution of the hotel murder. There is a final literary shrug at the end that suggests that social injustice is something that will not be resolved in the then immediate future. Hard to argue with that, looking back over the past 40 years, though it could be argued that Sweden has done better in that area than many other societies.

I liked this story, perhaps more than many other reviewers. The witty cynicism and terrific character development carry the story and keep the reader interested. Although there's no mistaking that the story's setting is Sweden, there is feeling to it similar to one of Georges Simenon's Maigret stories. Not a bad thing, all things considered.

I've read only a few of the Martin Beck books, but "Murder at the Savoy" made me want to continue with the series. Intelligent, funny and engaging. Recommended.

It was a warm July evening in Malmö. A businessman was speaking to a group. A strange man walked up to him and shot him in the head, then stepped out the open window and into the street. The victim Palmgren was a corporation president. The police questioned everyone who left town but no suspect was found. They learned of one man who flew to Stockholm, but the patrol car sent to the airport arrived too late. The National Chief of Police called Martin Beck and sent him to take charge of the Palmgren murder case. Palmgren's widow said the killer looked "completely ordinary" (Chapter 7). Beck learns of the political importance of this case: it involved foreign countries. The Security Police were now involved (Chapter 8). Chapter 12 starts by describing some of the conditions created by urban renewal and high-rise apartments in the former countryside.

The people who ate with Palmgren were investigated. One person there had a hidden side (Chapter 15). The summer heat and poverty created "unpremeditated crimes", almost like accidents. Another person is scooped up after a struggle (Chapter 17). Now Beck thinks the known facts point to one suspect (Chapter 21). An empty box for a pistol was found (Chapter 22), its owner identified (Chapter 25). More evidence turns up against the suspect (Chapters 26, 27). In Chapter 29 the suspect was brought in for questioning and told his story. Chapter 30 tells what would happen next to the people in this story.
This story uses Palmgren as a villain, but he is only a small fish in the business world. He was easily replaced.

This 6th Beck is not as strong as many others in the series, but has its merits. Malmo, Sweden-based international business scion Viktor Palmgren is murdered assassination-style during a dinner speech at Malmo's Savoy Hotel.

It appears that the murder must be business or politically motivated. Palmgren was a powerful, widely-known national figure, so Martin Beck, Superintendent of the National Homicide Squad, is called down from Stockholm to work the case.

Beck's higher-ups are under great pressure from their higher-ups to get this case solved fast because it turns out that the Swedish Govt. has been in bed with Palmgren, or at least complicit in certain controversial business activities, including weapons trade with unstable African nations.

It is related to Beck that the Swedish government's connection to Palmgren and certain of his activities, if made public, could cause 'irreparable damage' between Swedish people and their government- exposing a secret and dangerous conflict of values. So this, apparently, is the new version of the once-pious Swedish Welfare State (here fictionalized by Sjowall & Wahloo).

Portraits are painted by the authors of various rich and powerful suspects in the Palmgren murder; from Malmo to Stockholm to Copenhagen, Denmark. These characters are their surroundings are interesting and well depicted, if negatively.

As some actual evidence finally turns up, the mystery of who killed Viktor Palmgren takes some different twists and turns. In the end, the murderer is apprehended and the case is solved.

But Martin Beck is left with an empty feeling... Viktor Palmgren was a big cog in the works, but one easily replaced. As for the new incarnation of the Swedish State?

read this book, but also track down "Murder on the 31st Floor", which was the precursor to the Martin Beck series