Don't Look Back

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Norwegian Procedural -- #5 in the Sejer Series
Review: After being widely translated in Europe, it's about time that Fossum's excellent police procedurals are becoming available in English. Unfortunately this first book in translation is the fifth in the series, and so a bit of the background is lacking. The story starts with the disappearance of a young girl in a small Norwegian village, but adroitly segues into a murder investigation as the search for the girl turns up an unrelated naked corpse. The town is one of several small communities served by the city police, and grizzled Inspector Sejer and his younger partner Skarre are assigned to the case.

This is above all a psychological mystery, as Sejer and Skarre carefully poke and prod the small community, where everyone knows everyone else, in order to unravel the tale that led to the killing of a well-liked teenage girl. Although the townspeople have plenty of skeletons in their closets, the story never strays into cliché, as it might have under a less assured hand. Sejer is a placid and cunning detective of late middle age, living alone with his dog after being widowed (again, one senses that his personal life has been detailed in previous books). He bears a certain similarity to Det. Inspector Charlie Resnick, the protagonist of John Harvey's long-running Nottingham procedural series. Skarre works well as his younger, more informal partner, slightly treading on eggshells around his more experienced superior.

With no forensic evidence, no witnesses, and no apparent motive, there's little for them to go on. Thus, Sejer and Skarre spend the whole novel interviewing and reinterviewing everyone who knew the girl and might have seen something. As the tension builds, and various red herrings are dispensed with, Sejer grows convinced that the key to the murder lies in an abrupt change in the girl's behavior almost a year previously. This leads seamlessly to yet another layer within the story. Throughout, every character comes to life, and sometimes, the story shift to their perspective for several pages to add a richer depth to the unfolding investigation. Norway never really emerges as a distinct setting, it's a story that really could have been set in any small town in the first world, but it's an absorbing tale, which ends with a potentially unsettling coda.

PS. Danish television produced a four-hour miniseries from the book under the title "Se Deg Ikke Tilbake." With luck, it might be subtitled in English at some point...

Rating:
Summary: mischaracterization
Review: Fossum's book is mildly enjoyable; the prose is spare--perhaps too much so--but the story is interesting, albeit transparant in places. Some logical inconsistencies exist in the plotting, as well as a seemingly substantial emotional inconsistency re: the actions of the boyfriend toward the end of the story. (I'm trying not to give the ending away.) But, as the mother of a Down syndrome boy and an educated person with extensive knowledge on the subject of Down syndrome, I am queasy about Fossum's treatment of her Down syndrome character; sexual predation is virtually never part of the Down pathology. Down's people have enough troubles without being tagged with this kind of reputation. Granted, the last scene is ambiguous; however, its ominousness is clear.

Rating:
Summary: (4.5) An exciting new author for American audiences
Review: In the 5th of a popular Norwegian mystery series, now translated for American audiences, Don't Look Back retains all the character, names and places of its geography. Fossum introduces the compassionate Inspector Sejer, who propels the story and defines its emotional tone with Hitchcockian psychological twists and turns. A six-year-old child disappears and her parents fear the worst, then she suddenly returns home. A short while later, a teenaged girl is found murdered on a mountain path, her naked body thoughtfully covered with a jacket. The teenager's shocking death has unnerved all the residents, but there is an appalling paucity of clues for the inspector to work with on this puzzling case.

Charged with solving the murder in the picturesque setting below the Kollen Mountains, the gray-haired inspector Sejer pursues all leads, peeling away the façade of this idyllic village. Sejer is the backbone of the story, unobtrusive yet authoritative, skillfully unraveling the tragedy. The first suspect is the teenager's on-and-off again boyfriend, who has lived through a childhood so nightmarish that he barely survives, only to find himself first on the list of possible assailants. Next the inspector and his assistant, Jacob Skarre, interrogate the residents of each house on the street where the girl lived, gently probing into their routines, their familiarity with the deceased and their alibis for the time of the murder. Gradually the placid exterior of the village peels away, leaving a variety of dysfunctional households exposed along with an alarming number of plausible suspects.

The small Norwegian town that is the scene of the senseless murder is the same as Anywhere, USA, a simple, pastoral life surrounded by the beauty of nature. Inspector Sejer's talent lies in probing beneath the surface of everyday motives, where the average person is driven to intolerable limits; he understands the nature of evil, how rage and stupidity can overcome reason. Sifting through the most remote possibilities, his detective's instincts lead Sejer unerringly to the core of the mystery, compounding the tragedy of the young woman's death with profound injury to another victim of a blind system.

By turns more intricate, revealing and frightening, the story line is never predictable and often shocking. Mundane daily actions are suddenly suspect and one neighbor's inconsequential memory unlocks the whole chain of events. Certainly, Fossum has found her métier, structuring her characters with such deft strokes as to change innocence to threat in a heartbeat. The intricacies of human nature provide the grist for this tale, deep psychological chasms opened up by intolerable emotions that eventually explode into action. Inspector Sejer guides the uninitiated through a morass of possibilities, staring into the black heart of the criminal act that changes man to monster. Luan Gaines/2004.

Rating:
Summary: Another great Scandinavian police novel
Review: One morning the 6 year old Ragnhild disappears. When ispector Sejer arrives at the house of the deparate mother, the girl soon returns, but the inspector gets another challenge: the dead body of another girl, the 15 year old Annie Holland, a beautiful, athletic and friendly girl that has gone through a dramatic character change in the last year. There are a whole bunch of suspects: her boyfriend Halvor, the ex-husband of her mother, a very vague neighbour, the handball trainer, a father and son who live a little bit further down the road and also a young man with Down syndrome. Sejer and his colleague Skarre have problems finding out who did it and especially the motive behind the murder.

A very readable book that gives a nice insight into the lives of the inhabitants of an ou of the way Norwegian village. A real Scandinavian police novel: not a horrendous lot of action, but very good psychologival description of the various characters.

Rating:
Summary: More European Mysteries, Please!
Review: This fascinating psychological thriller makes you want to know what other gems have been published in Europe and are waiting for a translator. Japanese writer Matsuo Karino's "Out" was last year's inkling of the great stuff that is slowly finding its way into English. Felicity David's translation of Karen Fossum's book is fluid and immediate, and "Don't Look Back" is a novel that will appeal to readers who like their thrillers flavored with the spice of different cultures.

Rating:
Summary: More European Mysteries, Please!
Review: This fascinating psychological thriller makes you want to know what other gems have been published in Europe and are waiting for a translator. Japanese writer Matsuo Karino's "Out" was last year's inkling of the great stuff that is slowly finding its way into English. Felicity David's translation of Karen Fossum's book is fluid and immediate, and "Don't Look Back" is a novel that will appeal to readers who like their thrillers flavored with the spice of different cultures.

Rating:
Summary: Enigmatic psychological suspense - European style
Review: This fifth book in the Norwegian Inspector Konrad Sejer series, but the first to be published in the US, begins with the most chilling of scenes: 6-year-old Ragnhild accepting a ride from a strange, too eager man. Next we cut to her distraught, terrified mother being gently questioned by Sejer, who shares her dread.

But this scenario does not have the expected conclusion. The search party combing nearby Kollen mountain turn up the naked body of a local teenager, and Ragnhild is deposited on her doorstep by the lonely Downs-syndrome boy who had taken her to his home.

It's a small, close, valley community where everyone knows everyone else, though not as well as they think they do. The dead girl, Annie, had been bright, outgoing and well liked by everyone. Sure, she'd been subdued, even a bit withdrawn in the last few months, but her family and friends put it down to adolescence. Sejer thinks she had a secret.

As he and his assistant, young Jacob Skarre, begin to probe, they peel away layers of deception and self-deception, uncovering cracks and chasms under the tranquil surface. No surprise to Sejer, there are lots of secrets in this respectable, idyllic village, starting right in Annie's family. And there's the boyfriend - brutalized into passivity, he hardly seems her type.

Fossum is particularly adept at revealing character through details. A neighbor views Sejer's approach: "He assumed a strained expression, but then realized that this might make them suspicious; so he pulled himself together and tried a smile instead. Then he remembered that Annie was dead, and went back to the strained mask."

She steeps the story in its semi-rural, woods and mountain atmosphere, but just as telling are the characters' surroundings - a toy-strewn house or a muddy farmyard or a teenager's bedroom. Shifts in point of view heighten the psychological suspense and narrative depth. Sejer is a complex, thoughtful, empathetic character. Readers will hope to spend more time in his company.

Rating:
Summary: basic murder mystery
Review: This is a good murder mystery book to read, nothing really new or anything. I give it 3 stars because it does drag in spots, still a good read to see a non-american writer.