Customer Reviews

The Return: An Inspector Van Veeteren Mystery

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Inspector Van Veeteren is the real gem in this budding series of police procedural novels written by Swede Hakan Nesser. Van Veeteren is the classic chief inspector--crotchety, brusque, prone to flashes of insight gained from mundane life, and a soft spot for his junior partner.

Whether he's driving around listening to Monteverdi or grousing about his upcoming surgery, the inspector manages to make the book funny and interesting. Nesser somehow manages to write just a little bit differently about life and happiness, and he injects reality into his characters that make them endearing. The plot is not all that gripping, but Mr. Nesser moves the storyline along nicely without getting bogged down in meaningless descriptions or red herrings.

At the end of the day, however, the characters make the book. Van Veeteren is the center, but his coworkers and associates are ones you'd like to get to know. Using his native Sweden makes Nesser's books even more interesting to the US audience that is just learning to love this author worthy to share the table with Henning Mankell.

One of the great things that has happened in mystery publishing over the past few years, is the flood of translated books from overseas which has given American (and other Anglophone) readers a new world of social and political perspectives through the genre. Hakan Nesser is one of these recently translated authors and a very good one, he is. "The Return," part of his Inspector Van Veeteren series, has the feel of an authentic police investigation throughout. The reader is taken through many routine interrogations in a murder investigation which only very gradually add up to a solution to the case. The case itself is bizaare and convoluted, involving the murders of three people, including a convicted murderer recently paroled from prison. While the central figure in the book is Chief Inspector Van Veeteren of the Maardam police, his junior colleagues get most of the story space here and their characters are well developed and credible. Oddly, though author Nesser is a Swede, his story is set in a small city in The Netherlands.

This is classic detective story that will be appreciated by any fan of this domain of fiction.

Hakan Nesser's "The Return" is another of the good Swedish police procedurals translated for consumption by the English speaking market. On the whole, the novel is a compelling read diminished only by Nesser's shallow development of his characters except for the victimized villain. The author has a penchant for commencing chapters with riveting plot action without identifying his characters. While this makes the action suspenseful, is can also cause confusion.

The storyline revolves around an inquest conducted by Chief Inspector Van Veeteren and his squad of detectives in the Maardam police department. A decapitated corpse also missing hands and feet was discovered wrapped in a carpet by a pre-schooler in a wooded area during a class outing. Immediately the investigation was two pronged. Exactly who was the victim and who was his murderer?

Adding depth to the storyline Van Veeteren was being operated on for a colon resection owing to cancer. He would conduct the investigation in part from his convalescent bed.

The detectives soon discover that the victim was one Leopold Verhaven. The notorious Verhaven, once a world class middle distance runner, had served two separate 12 year prison terms for the murders of two young women he was romantically involved with. As Van Veeteren looks back at the evidence from the previous killings he gets the feeling that Verhaven might hane been innocent.

Using unorthodox means, Van Veeteren and his minions take great pains to uncover the identity of Verhaven's murderer, speculating that this person also committed the crimes that Verhaven was implicated for.

This one is up with the best from any country but retains its Scandanavian
flavor. While Henning Mankell is perhaps the more famous author in this
country, Nesser deserves a place among the top international mystery writers.
A very good story with developed characters that make you care.

It was an early morning in August; Leopold Verhaven walks free after serving twenty four years in prison for double murder. He feels the first rays of warmth from the sun on his face; his aim, to quietly return home. On a rainy day the following April a child on a field trip wanders off into the woods alone, frantically the adults and party of friends search for the young girl they find her safe but disturbingly sitting next to a mutilated corpse half wrapped in carpet.

A new case for Chief Inspector Van Veeteren or was it? His stubborn determination not to let a case go unsolved, even if it was from a hospital bed while recovering from surgery. The decomposing body is soon identified as a local man the murderer Leopold Verhaven or so they believe. Van Veeteren becomes rattled at this news, his quick to reopen the old cases for the killings of Verhaven two lovers. Could it be that Verhaven had been judged by character and not by evidence all those years ago, was it never on anyone lips he may have been innocent? Maybe Verhaven really did commit those crimes and now this lastest killing is someone's act of revenge at long last. The only way to solve this present case was to review old documentation with complicated history of what now could be a few near perfect murders.

This Swedish series is coming to us translated out of order and quiet some years later. The Return I certainly prefered much more to the pervious novel, one small drawback for me, I felt some other police characters part of Inspector Van Veeteren team needed to be a bit more developed, you get the feeling you touch base with them but something is being held back, still we may learn more as the translation series goes on.

One character that really shines through in this book is Van Veeteren, after his serious surgical procedure his in a lighter philosophical mood with more humor and irony surfacing; and with that wonderful no nonsense attitude that I just happen to love, he couldn't go wrong. He also faces the prospect in this one of taking the law into his own hands, as he realizes the flaws in the justice system. Van Veeteren overstepping certain boundaries is very intriguing to read.

Another reason I found The Return more enjoyable would be the jump back and forth in time looking at different angles into a close-knit community with changes taking place and testimony from witnesses being broken down. We as the readers are let lose for a while, staying one step ahead of the police, the author gives to us a little extra piece of information on a certain date and time line, I found that very clever and interesting.

Håkan Nesser the Author worked as a teacher in Uppsala before turning his hand to writing Novels. In Sweden, his detective stories around Inspector Van Veeteren has received numerous honors. After reading this Novel I'm looking forward to future books in translation from this Author.

Wonderful psychological thriller. Recommended.

Andrea Bowhill

Another excellent example of mystery writing that does NOT depend on sex, violence and four letter words to tell a story that keeps you wondering about the outcome. You soon feel you know Van Veeteren and the conditions he works under as if they are old friends. You really feel the chill and damp of Scandinavian winters.

Hakan Nesser's "The Return" takes place in 1994 in an unnamed northern European country. A six-year-old girl finds the torso of a homicide victim who was dumped in the woods with his head, hands, and feet removed. The police eventually identify the corpse as Leopold Verhaven, an eccentric who had spent over twenty years in prison for murdering two women, one in 1962, and the second in 1981. Verhaven, who had a bad reputation and an off-putting personality, was tried and found guilty in the press and was subsequently convicted based on circumstantial evidence. Although he stoically accepted his punishment, Verhaven consistently maintained his innocence.

Nesser's protagonist is the irreverent, sarcastic, and brilliantly intuitive Detective Chief Inspector Van Veeteren (nicknamed VV), who is intrigued by the Verhaven case. Unfortunately, he is temporarily sidetracked when he enters the hospital for surgery. His right-hand man, Munster, dutifully visits his workaholic boss and keeps him informed while he recuperates. VV familiarizes himself with Verhaven's background and becomes fascinated by the investigation's twists and turns.

"The Return" is a chilling police procedural that is enhanced by a healthy dose of black humor, witty repartee, and a narrative rich in vivid detail. As is the case in so many novels of this type, the detectives laboriously explore numerous leads, most of which turn out to be dead ends. Nesser moves back and forth in time, enabling the reader to observe key events through the eyes of Verhaven, his acquaintances, and the police officers who struggle to unravel the tangled threads of a crime that may be impossible to solve. In addition, the author has created a colorful group of minor characters, including the victim's neighbors in the small "rural backwater" of Kaustin where he lived, the judge who helped put Verhaven in prison, and the police chief, who angrily tells VV that if he cannot close the case quickly, he should summarily drop it and move on.

When VV finally takes charge of the inquiry, he uses his keen powers of observation and out-of-the box thinking to identify a clever and so far, extremely lucky killer. However, is there enough evidence to prove the perpetrator's guilt? VV engages in some uncharacteristic soul searching, as he tries to find a way to punish someone who may very well be untouchable. "The Return" is gripping and suspenseful, and it has a fluid prose style for which the translator, Laurie Thompson, deserves much credit. This compulsively readable novel raises thorny and unsettling questions about the difficulty of dispensing justice in a world that is sometimes cruel and unpredictable.

The Return is the second book (at least in the US) by Hakan Nesser, and continues the story of Inspector Van Veeteren, a very wise detective who has pretty much seen it all. As the story opens, the Inspector is in the hospital having surgery. A decapitated torso, also minus its hands and feet, was discovered by a little girl during a pre-school class outing in the woods. There is one telltale piece of physical evidence that may identify the body and it turns out to be a recently-released murderer who's returned to the area. But who killed him? And why? This is what Van Veeteren must discover, trusting the fieldwork to his subordinates while he's laid up at the hospital. This book is more of a psychological thriller rather than a straightforward mystery, and frankly, while it was good, it wasn't as good as Borkmann's Point, the series predecessor. Oh well -- I still enjoyed it a great deal and would gladly recommend it. I would recommend starting with Borkmann's Point -- you get a lot of Van Veeteren's quirkiness laid out at the very beginning in that first series novel. The writing is well done, the characterizations are excellent, and the story is quite good. The book shifts backwards and forward in time, so be careful. The ending was unexpected; I understood why the author made it so but it is definitely food for thought if you're so inclined. I'd recommend it to people who have read Borkmann's Point, and those who enjoy a mystery set in foreign countries. As noted, it is more psychological than action, but it does tie together well.

Kept me on the edge of my seat!
Well written. Great characters. Great story.
Loved Brookman Point as well.

After reading all of the Stieg Larsson and Henning Mankell novels my affinity for Swedish crime novels has not been diminished. Therefore, I have turned with delight to novels by Hakan Nesser. Nesser is a former school teacher who has won the Gold Key Award for the best crime novel of the year for "Carambole."
The Return is the creepy story of a corpse found lacking arms and feet. The victim is Leopold Verhaven. Verhaven was a famous track star in the 1950s. His life had nosedived and he had spent 24 years in prison for the murders of two women. On the day he is released from prison he is grotesquely murdered. Whodunit?
Chief Inspector Van Veeteren has personal troubles as well as the perplexing Verhaven case to deal with. He is facing cancer of the intestine surgery as the novel begins. Like Mankell's star detective Kurt Wallender, Van Veeteren is also middle-aged, divorced and a lover of classical music. His favorites include Monteverde, Scandinavian church music and the elegant Sir Edward Elgar.
Van Veteeren and his capable team of investigators ferret out the details of the murders of Beatrice Holden and Marlene Nietsch attributed to Verhaeven. These crimes were twenty years apart transpiring in 1962 and 1981.
Nesser is good at dialogue and atmospheric description of bleak Swedish scenes. His style is spare and laced with profanity. The Return is a good read!