There is a lot to like about this book. The author created characters that I became invested in to the point that I cared about the outcome of their relationship. The most important secondary characters were reasonably well developed and added to the progress of the story. Most importantly, the author provided originality in both the plot, setting and action of the story. It's not every day that you read a love story set against intrigue in Swedish financial markets and find yourself liking it. The author was very deft in providing enough financial detail to support the central complication of the plot without it bogging down the story.
That said, there are also some things that I did not care for. First, I think that the story may have lost something in the translation from Swedish to English, specifically in the dialog. There were times that the speech in the dialog was too casual for the tension in the scene. I also think the translator should have trusted an English speaking audience to understand that what we call soccer in the U.S. is called football in Sweden and most, if not all of Europe. To have Swedish characters referring to their national game as soccer is as unlikely as me eating pickled herring. It was odd and off putting.
Second, the 'villains' of the story were very, very stereotyped. I don't want to give anything away by being too descriptive, but trust me when I tell you that picking out the 'bad guys' was not hard because they had absolutely no redeeming qualities. I prefer my villains to have something that explains their perspective or that keeps them from being so unrelentingly bad. I think it provides a little more tension in the story and comes closer to being more realistic.
Finally, I felt like the story bogged down with excessive melodrama. Again, I won't go into great detail, but suffice to say that a good deal of this story line mirrors much of what you might see on the old television soap operas like "One Life to Live,' and 'The Young and the Restless.' Those old soaps have nothing on 'All In' and it got just got a bit too predictable and melodramatic for my taste.
Bottom line: It's still a good read, but not a perfect read. The set up for the next book was in the epilogue, but I didn't much care for the character that book will be about so I am undecided as to whether or not I will read that next book when or if it comes available.
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