Customer Reviews

Unseen: A Mystery (Inspector Anders Knutas Mysteries)

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The friends meet at a resort on the Swedish island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea. Helena is with Per; Emma with her spouse; Olle and his neighbors Eva and Rikard; and finally Beata and her American husband are all there. However, instead of an amiable get together at the trendy tourist locale they chose, jealousies explode leading to accusations and rage.

Not long afterward, the prime focus of the dispute Helena vanishes from her home on the island. However, she is quickly found dead, someone brutally used an ax to hack her to death. Police Inspector Anders Knutas leads the island investigation, but makes no progress as everyone is in shock and denial. As he struggles with the homicide investigation two more brutal murders of females occur amongst the friends, Anders wonders if this is a case of nine little Indians leading to one or just no female survivors.

This is an entertaining serial killer Swedish police procedural in which the audience will have solved the case before Anders figures out what is going on. That is the strength of the story line as it brings freshness that the detective is average not a Wallender offspring or a Clouseau clone which still can frustrate the audience that he cannot see the obvious links. The setting is terrific for this fine Swedish whodunit.

Harriet Klausner

This is as much a romance novel as it is a story about a serial killer. Most of the female characters have extensive experience in affairs of the heart, and it least one of them is falling "head over heels in love" with one of the protagonists. Should she leave her husband for this hot new guy, or will she stay with her nice but dull husband and kids? Gimme a break. If you are lookiing for a "noirish" detective or police novel, this isn't it!

I enjoyed Unseen, which I picked up in London where Swedish mysteries
are very popular. THis writer was new to me but she certainly creates
an environment of mystery and suspense on the island of Gotland where a
brutal murder of a woman and her dog occurs. You will have trouble guessin
who is murdering women on the island, while Insp. ANders takes you along
on his investigation. There is also a love story that develops between a news reporter Johan and Emma, a schoolmate of the victim. I am reading the
next mystery soon.

Scandinavian crime novels took the world by the storm. Deftly written, dark and exotic, made wellcome change to regular run off the mill stuff that we are being fed in the USA.
Some people call them gloomy and depressing. I strongly disagree with that statement. They just happen to be much more realistic than the feel good drivel showered upon the unsuspecting American readers.
" Unseen" is not the best of the modern Scandinavian mystery. The plot is not much more than the average serial killer fare. The detectives are hard to describe because they don't live much impression.
On the positive side it is a quick and effortless read, and I might try another one of her books.

First Line: The evening was turning out better than expected.

No couple wants their party to end with thrown punches and jealous accusations, but the party thrown by Per and Helena in their cabin on Gotland ended exactly that way. The next morning, Helena's body is found-- she's been the victim of a brutal axe murder. Normally a quiet island that bustles when all the summer visitors arrive, Gotland puts Inspector Anders Knutas in charge of the investigation. Clues may be slow to piece together, but two more grisly murders follow in rapid succession. Knutas has his work cut out for him, and he has yet to decide if the presence of reporter Johan Berg is more help or hindrance.

After reading two of Johan Theorin's novels which are also set on the island of Gotland, I felt as though I were already familiar with the location, but Jungstedt's focus is on the towns and not the natural world. Through her descriptions of communities like Visby, I am now more aware of the history of the area.

I enjoyed Jungstedt's characterizations of Knutas and his wife as well as the reporter Johan Berg, but the secondary characters were two-dimensional and didn't really come to life. I also found the killer's motivations to be a bit cliched, and the police slow to jump at some rather obvious clues.

On the whole, however, I enjoyed Unseen and thought it shows quite a bit of promise. I'll be looking for other books in this series.