Customer Reviews

The Pyramid: The First Wallander Cases (Vintage Crime/Black Lizard)

5 star:		(32)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Kurt Wallander, the intuitive inspector, first came upon the scene as a 42-year-old detective with many years of experience in the first novel in the series. After four more novels, Henning Mankell realized that what was missing was Wallander's background. So he started to write several short stories to fill in the blanks. Three more novels in the series appeared before the five short stories in this volume were completed.

In the first short story, we find Wallander in Malmo as a uniformed patrolman who bumbles his way into the investigation into the murder of his next door neighbor, the beginning of his career as a homicide detective. It is during this period that he meets and weds Mona. The next story takes the couple to Ystad and the birth of Linda, their daughter. It is, of course, where he spends the rest of his career. The stories trace the development of Wallander's instincts as well as his divorce, relationship with his father and growing daughter.

All the characteristics of the novels in the series are present in these short stories. It is essential history and embellishes Wallander's personality. Also, the common thread in all the novels, the deterioration of society, runs through the stories. This book is Mankell in top form. For Mankell/Wallander fans, a must read, and highly recommended.

First (at least in my consciousness) there were the ten Martin Beck police procedurals of Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo, published from 1965 to 1975. Now we flock to bookstores and movie theaters to enter the world of Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomqvist, who sprang from the mind of the late Stieg Larsson in the captivating form of the Millennium Trilogy.

In between there was Kurt Wallender, the moody small-town police inspector created by another masterful Swedish writer, Henning Mankell. Wallender made his first appearance (in English) in 1997 in the novel Faceless Killers. Wallender lived on through seven other novels, the last of which, Firewall, appeared in English translation in 2002. (An eighth, and reportedly last, Wallender novel is due in 2011 under the title The Troubled Man.) The series has won numerous awards and gained a large audience in the English-speaking world -- deservedly so, in my opinion.

The Pyramid is something of an afterthought but no less worth reading than the Wallender novels. It's a collection of five stories that span the time from Wallender's rookie year on the police force until the period when, a mature and respected inspector, the crimes detailed in Faceless Killers took place. As he ages from his early 20s to his 50s, Wallender grows increasingly morose in the face of his dysfunctional family relationships and the senseless crimes he is called upon to solve. The Pyramid lays bare the roots of his problems. For any Kurt Wallender fan, it's well worth reading.

Mankell is a serious writer. Like Sjowall, Wahloo, and Larsson, he is a man of the Left, and his writing explores the changes in Swedish society that have come about under the impact of drugs, immigration, and the newly competitive political environment which has brought conservatives as well as socialists into power.

(From Mal Warwick's Blog on Books)

The Pyramid introduces reader to character they came to know in later Mankell mysteries. We learn much about why Wallender is depressed and how he views his role as a police officer. His relationship with his father, who succumbs to Alzheimer's, is introduced in the first story in the collection. The writing is as accomplished as in the later Wallander mysteries.

Those of us who have eagerly awaited further translations of Henning Mankell's excellent Wallander novels now have these five stories that fill in gaps regarding the inspector's early career. The backstory of the books has always been compelling, adding to the richness of the stories and characterizations. Without belaboring the point, Mankell seamlessly enhances his fiction with issues that reach beyond the borders of Swedish jurisdiction. This has always been his strength, making him unique among the influx of international police procedural authors.

The Pyramid is an excellent group of stories. The first three let you get to know Kurt Wallender as a young man and the last two portray him as a more seasoned police investigator much like the one we know from the full length novels. One can easily see why his social relationships are doomed to failure. He seems to have no gift for relating to a love partner. But as a detective he has no peer. As police procedurals, the stories give alot of insight into the nature of criminal investigation and, more broadly, into changes imposed by modernity on Swedish life. These changes have also occurred in other countries and are often publically discussed in the case of the U.S.

Every Henning Mankell fan missed his wonderful Kurt Wallender series
after reading his grim and grimly political more recent work. This work is an
added and unexpected bonus as Mankell goes back and reconstructs Wallender's
life leading up to the more familiar series. It is a series of stories leading
up to the beginning of the books. As always, beautifully written and worth more
as literature than mystery, although the mysteries are gems. The early stories
about Wallender's early life are sketchy and a bit lifeless. As time passes,
stories get better leading up to "The Pyramid" which is a Mankell masterpiece.
A must read for anyone who sees that mysteries have become the mainstream of
contemporary fiction - or for anyone who just loves a great, atmospheric
mystery.

Following the phenomenal success of the late Swedish writer Stieg Larsson's three novels, a groundswell of interest rose to read other Swedish crime fiction. Many turned to Hemming Mankell, already successful in selling his Kurt Wallander detective thrillers and the TV movies based on some of them.

Mankell's Wallander crime books were first published in Sweden in 1991 and in English in 1997. His first volume involved a Wallander case in 1990 when Wallander was a senior detective 42 years old. After completing eight full-length Wallander novels, and after receiving requests from his readers, Mankell decided to write short stories telling the early tales of his detective. These five stories were collected in The Pyramid.

The first, Wallander's First Case, begins in 1969 when Wallander is twenty. He takes a job as a patrolman against the strong mocking objections of his eccentric father. He wants to be a detective. He works hard and spends hours learning the ropes to impress his superiors. He has a girl friend who constantly criticizes him for being late, even though she knows that he is late because of his job. He lives in an apartment with thin walls and hears a gun shot. He is told by the detectives that his neighbor committed suicide. He feels that he must investigate to find out what really occurred even though the detective in charge insists that he not do so. Readers read asking themselves many questions. Will his actions stymie his goal to be a detective? Will he solve the case? What strange people will he encounter? Why do people dislike patrolmen? Why is he stabbed?

The second story is The Man with the Mask. It is 1975. Wallander is now a detective and married to his girl friend. She is still complaining that he is always late. When he is leaving to go home, his superior sends him to a store to investigate whether a woman who called the police saying that there is a strange man outside her store is in danger. Wallander finds the woman dead. He is hit on the head and tied up. When he regains consciousness, he sees a man with a hood holding a gun. Why is the man there? Why did he kill the woman? Does he want to kill the detective? How can Wallendar save himself?

The Man on the Beach is the third tale. It is 1987. Wallander is having serious problems with his wife. He expects a divorce. A man takes a taxi from a beach back to town. When the ride is over, the driver discovers that the man is dead. The coroner says he died of poison. When was it administered? Why? Who did it? Why was the man at the beach?

The Death of a Photographer, the fourth story, occurs in 1988 when Wallendar is forty. A photographer, who was estranged from his wife for twenty years, although both lived in the same house, is clubbed to death. He had taken pictures of prominent people, mostly politicians, and distorted them, making the faces recognizable but ugly. One picture is of Wallendar who is revolted at what he sees. Why did the photographer do this? Is he crazy? Why did he garble Wallander's face? Are the distortions related to his murder?

The Pyramid is the longest of the five tales. It is 1989. Wallendar is divorced. He is involved in a case of a small plane crash where two smugglers are killed. Later more people are killed, including two erasable spinster women who run a small sowing shop but have millions in the bank and in stocks. Is there more than one crime? Can Wallendar solve everything?

Mankell's The Pyramid was a great read. It helped fill in some "before-hand" gaps to other novels as well as to help better understand Wallander and his work. I thoroughly enjoyed this book....which along with Shadows in the Twilight and Eye of the Leopard complete my collection of all the translated books by Mankell. He has been perhaps the "best" of the mystery writers! I hope there will be more translated books in the near future.

I'm an odd duck when it comes to mysteries. I'd rather read a mystery where the writer has done tons of work to develop a credible, complex, rich character than a book where the author has built an intricate plot but neglected character. With that preface, I'll admit that I liked these five Kurt Wallender stories a good deal.

Wallender is a likable, and mildly conflicted, guy. We see him age twenty years over the course of these stories, and the reader can't help notice, by the end of the book, that Wallender is suffering middle-age angst, accompanied by doubts about the future of Swedish culture in a world of increasing drug traffic and violence. The character of Kurt Wallender is the best reason for picking this book up, along with interest in northern European culture and day-to-day life. Indeed, these stories are full of Wallender's daily living (e.g., the man has to sign up to do his laundry in his building's only washing machine; remembering to buy toilet paper in the course of a busy investigation is another minor challenge). There's plenty of realism here, and I like that; Wallender and his police work end up seeming real. He's not a super hero.

My one complaint, though, is that the stories frequently seem hurried (perhaps evenly poorly thought out) in their conclusions. Wallender faces physical violence, sometimes almost out of the blue, in the last page or two, followed by a quick explanation of who committed the crime and why. (The worst example of this is found in the final pages of "The Death of the Photographer," where Wallender briefs his police colleagues on how the crime was committed and what motivated the perpetrator. The scene is all too reminiscent of cozy mysteries where the detective shares his wisdom at the very end of the story. An odd way to end a story that is, like the other stories in the book, otherwise a police procedural.)

If you're looking for suspenseful plotting, this might not be the best choice. If, on the other hand, you want to live for a while in the mind of a low-key, hard-working Swedish cop, and you enjoy a book that is strong on atmosphere and setting, you will likely want to pour yourself a good cup of coffee and dig into this collection. (For my part, I plan to pick up Faceless Killers, Mankell's first Wallender novel, in the next week or two.)

Henning Mankell is one of Sweden's most prolific and successful crime novelists. In "The Pyramid" he has provided readers with five stories occurring throughout the illustrious career of Detective Kurt Wallender. The stories vary in length from a few pages to "The Pyramid" which is almost 200 pages. The stories are:
1. Wallander's First Case: The 21 year old Kurt Wallender is a police officer living in Malmo. He is engaged to his future wife Mona. She works as a hairdresser and the couple hope to take a vacation. His father gives him problems since he hate's Kurt's decision to become a police officer. A man is murdered next door and Wallender investigates the thorny case. Wallender's love life is rocky since Mona is upset at the long hours he keeps.
2. The Man With the Mask. It is Christmas Eve 1975 as Wallender leaves police headquarters for an evening of celebration with his family of Mona and daughter Linda. A call comes in to him and he goes to a store where the owner has been murdered. Wallender nearly loses his life as he must face the mank with the mask. The story deals with racial prejudice in South Africa. An excellent story!
3. The Man on the Beach is a story of revenge. A retired lawyer and doctor are involved in this exciting tale.
4. The Death of the Photographer is a fascinating mystery in which a benign photographer is murdered late one night in his studio. The only clue is a dropped Swedish Church hymnbook! A tale of love and revenge in which Mankell is writing at the top of his considerable literary game!
5. The Pryamid is a story in which Kurt's artist father takes a trip to the Pyramids in Egypt! In Egypt he is arrested and Wallender must rescue him from his imprisonment. In Sweden Wallender has to connect the dots linking the crash of a plane and the weird murder by fire of two spinster sisters.
These tales are taut with excitement and we learn more about the personal life of Kurt Wallender. A must for all fans of Mankell, Sweidish detective fiction and murder mysteries. Highly recommended!