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The Snowman: A Harry Hole Novel [Kindle Edition]

Jo Nesbo , Don Bartlett
4.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (392 customer reviews)

Print List Price: $14.95
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Sold by: Random House Digital, Inc.
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Book Description

Internationally acclaimed crime writer Jo Nesbø’s antihero police investigator, Harry Hole, is back: in a bone-chilling thriller that will take Hole to the brink of insanity.

Oslo in November. The first snow of the season has fallen. A boy named Jonas wakes in the night to find his mother gone. Out his window, in the cold moonlight, he sees the snowman that inexplicably appeared in the yard earlier in the day. Around its neck is his mother’s pink scarf.

Hole suspects a link between a menacing letter he’s received and the disappearance of Jonas’s mother—and of perhaps a dozen other women, all of whom went missing on the day of a first snowfall. As his investigation deepens, something else emerges: he is becoming a pawn in an increasingly terrifying game whose rules are devised—and constantly revised—by the killer.

Fiercely suspenseful, its characters brilliantly realized, its atmosphere permeated with evil, The Snowman is the electrifying work of one of the best crime writers of our time.


From the Hardcover edition.

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Amazon Best Books of the Month, May 2011: The Snowman, Norwegian author Jo Nesbø's U.S. debut, should please even the most die-hard Stieg Larsson fans. On the first day of snow, a child wakes up to find his mother has disappeared during the night. Outside, a snowman has appeared out of nowhere, the calling card of one of the most terrifying serial killers in recent fiction. A letter from the perpetrator draws Detective Hole further and further into the case, and together with his new partner, Katrine Bratt, he hunts the Snowman through twists and turns that become increasingly personal and may drive Hole to the brink of insanity. Brilliantly crafted, this credible and dark page-turner fully fleshes out the characters, especially Hole, a hardened detective with sharp instincts and real heart. What is the link between the victims? Is the Snowman a suspicious doctor, a notorious playboy, or one of Hole's peers on the force? The police keep thinking they've caught the criminal, but Hole's astute observations may steer him around the red herrings and right into the hands of the cold-as-ice killer. --Miriam Landis

Review

“Jo Nesbø is my new favorite thriller writer and Harry Hole my new hero.” —Michael Connelly


From the Hardcover edition.

Product Details

  • File Size: 2037 KB
  • Print Length: 401 pages
  • Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0307595862
  • Publisher: Vintage (May 10, 2011)
  • Sold by: Random House Digital, Inc.
  • Language: English
  • ASIN: B004G5ZY7E
  • Text-to-Speech: Enabled
  • X-Ray: Enabled
  • Lending: Not Enabled
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,356 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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Customer Reviews

The story moves very quickly and has lots of twists and turns to keep you guessing. R.T. Mones  |  84 reviewers made a similar statement
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
330 of 350 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Extra Information: The first two books for this Harry Hole series The Bat Man and The Cockroaches have not been produced for translation at this time. The Redbreast: A Novel would be the third book in this series; if you were to start this series my recommendation would be from The Redbreast. The series then follows through in order with Nemesis: A Novel (Harry Hole), The Devil's Star: A Novel, The Redeemer followed by The Snowman which then brings us readers in wait for The Leopard.

Review - The Snowman (Harry Hole, Book Seven)

Little snowflakes start to fall taunting us with what's to come. Flurries grow stronger settling softly on the ground, powdery and fluffy at first but darkness soon takes hold, the cycle turns. Subfreezing temperatures, crystals formulate and yet dipped in magical moonlight everything sparkles and glisten. This brings a gentle calm of all things white and beautiful..............until someone builds a Snowman!

November Oslo, Jo Nesbř brings us into his story during family hour. The first snow has fallen and a discussion is taking place about a solitary figure looming in the garden. A snowman with big black stone eyes staring into the house and yet no one seems to know who built it. That same evening a young boy wakes to find his mother missing, he looks for her but all he finds is her pink scarf which the snowman is now wearing.
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114 of 121 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Beware the Falling Snow March 21, 2010
Format:Hardcover
Jo Nesbř: THE SNOWMAN

This is Nesbř's seventh Harry Hole novel, but the fifth to be published in English. While this is a serial killer novel, which I normally don't care for, I did enjoy this book. Nesbř is a fluid, lyrical writer, Don Bartlett a talented translator, and Harry Hole a compelling character.

It's the first snowfall of the season and a snowman appears outside young Jonas's house. Strangely, the snowman is facing the house, rather than the street. In the middle of the night, Jonas awakes and finds his mother is missing, but her scarf is now around the snowman's neck.

As Harry's team works this missing-persons case, Harry fears that they are actually dealing with a serial killer who has left a note for Harry, taunting him. His fear heightens as other crimes are discovered that seem to him to be related.

As in previous books in this series, there are certain themes that connect the crimes being investigated and Harry's life. The complexity of the various plots means that the book begins slowly and deliberately to get the stories in motion. Then, about halfway through, things take off and become breathtakingly tense and exciting.

Several times you may think you have the whodunnit figured out, but there are more twists and turns to come. You learn new clues along with Harry, so there is no feel of trickery in the plot's movement. This is typical of a Harry Hole mystery, though in this case, probably because of the nature of the crime, the red-herring suspects were less believable than usual.

Harry's relationships with his team, his superiors and his former lover Rakel and her son Oleg continue to be an important part of the books. And as always, Oslo itself is almost another character.
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63 of 70 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars The Perfect Thriller August 3, 2010
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
Nothing like curling up with a good serial killer. But that is exactly what you should do. Go on, get good and comfy, turn off the phone, gather up your favorite munchies and prepare for a pounding long session with Jo Nesbo's Harry Hold and his neighborhood of friends and thugs. The fifth (English publication) in a series from master Norwegian yarn spinner, Nesbo maintains Detective Hole's premier position as the best of the hard driven cops in print. Not your typical boiler plate fare, this series stays taut and original from opening to close. Nesbo's books are extremely atmospheric with the Norwegian weather becoming a tactile character on its own. Likable or not depending on their personal take on life, the human characters are distinctive thinking forms of flesh and blood. Colors are every shade of gray in your imagination. There's just something about the way Nesbo weaves his tale and creates Hold's world that make his books unforgettable and not-put-downable.
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22 of 23 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
In his fifth novel starring Oslo police inspector Harry Hole and his fellow officers, author Jo Nesbo provides a complete surprise. The Snowman, unlike his other novels, contains an element of horror that may soon make this his most popular novel among US audiences, a breakthrough novel which may finally put to rest the misperception that the Norwegian Nesbo is some kind of "successor" to the Swedish Stieg Larsson. It takes nothing away from Larsson and his terrific Millenium trilogy to say that Nesbo is a more versatile and more polished writer who has now written sixteen novels since 1997, including three children's novels, all of them huge successes in Scandinavia. He has received eight major prizes for his work and four "shortlist" nominations. If you enjoy tantalizing mysteries in the "Nordic Noir" genre and have not yet discovered Nesbo, I guarantee that when you do, you will not ever compare him to any other Scandinavian writer.

The novel opens dramatically in 1980, as Sara, a young mother with her son in the car, makes a stop at the home of her lover for a last goodbye. Their love-making is observed by a snowman who looms at the window, and Sara's young son, waiting in the car, believes that they are all going to die. Nothing more is heard about this episode, but in 1992, a terrible murder and dismemberment takes place on top of a mountain in Bergen, the first of the disappearances/murders by a serial killer who strikes on the first day of snow each year from 1992 - 2004. Each crime is witnessed by a snowman who appears at the murder scene. Police inspector Harry Hole, in charge of the investigation, is soon being taunted by the snowman whose sole purpose seems to be to suggest that innocent people are behind the crimes.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars gripping
The Snowman was brilliant, again i was lead into Harry Hole's life of detective work and trying to find the killer while becoming attached to the characters and gripping the book... Read more
Published 23 hours ago by Kelly Johns
5.0 out of 5 stars I loved it
I never have read Jo Nesbo's books before. I thought the story was original and well written and the main character, Harry Hole was very interesting. Read more
Published 1 day ago by jill krueger
5.0 out of 5 stars Good author..
Another good Harry Hole novel. Can't wait for this one to be made into a movie. Have moved on to the next book in he series. A decent enjoyable read.
Published 2 days ago by Linzi Corbett
4.0 out of 5 stars Creepy and compelling
Great sense of place and loads of conflicted characters with secrets - plus a creepy killer. Even though I had this figured out halfway in, I went along for the rest of the ride to... Read more
Published 3 days ago by Carolyn J. Rose
4.0 out of 5 stars The Snowman---It kept me concentrating and the thinking of the snowman...
I would recommend it to a mature person with an interest in psychology and thriller reading. It was my first Harry Hole novel and I enjoyed it.
Published 4 days ago by Jimi Berry Cline
5.0 out of 5 stars The Snowman is completely thrilling!
Once again, Jo Nesbo has created a page-turning thriller in The Snowman. And, once again, his villian was not apparent, at least to me, until the end, with several likely suspects... Read more
Published 7 days ago by KMB
5.0 out of 5 stars Nesbo Making My Summer
A friend turned me on to The Leopard by this author which I absolutely loved. The Snowman is probably my second favorite book of his so far - I am reading them all this summer. Read more
Published 8 days ago by Janet M. Freer
5.0 out of 5 stars Wow.....a terrific read.
This is my 4th Nesbo mystery; although I finished reading it 2 weeks ago. It has stayed with me. It was my favorite reading so far this year. Read more
Published 10 days ago by Jimmyw95
4.0 out of 5 stars snowman was creepily enthralling
Once again, Jo Nesbo has created a page-turning thriller in The Snowman. And, once again, his villian was not apparent, at least to me, until the end, with several likely... Read more
Published 12 days ago by donna esperon
5.0 out of 5 stars My Introduction to Nesbo
Nesbo's work was highly recommended to me by the Scandinavian Crime Fiction fans at GoodReads. I asked, Where should I start? Read THE SNOWMAN! was the universal suggestion. Read more
Published 16 days ago by Will Ravenel
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More About the Author

Jo NesbØ is a musician, songwriter, economist, and author. He is the recipient of numerous prizes and awards, including the Glass Key, the Riverton Prize, and the Booksellers Prize, and one of his Harry Hole novels was voted best Norwegian crime novel of all time by Norwegian readers. He lives in Oslo.

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It's a "stand-alone" story. You'll love it if you love mysteries and strong characters.
Jun 5, 2011 by Kenneth A. Manire |  See all 3 posts
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