The Terrorists

Rating:
Summary: Grand Finale of a great series
Review: Although it has been several years since I read this book, it is the culmination of a great series that is part mystery, part social commentary and part satire. All of the Martin Beck mysteries are good and should be read in order beginning with Roseanne and ending with this book.

Rating:
Summary: Grand Finale of a great series
Review: Although it has been several years since I read this book, it is the culmination of a great series that is part mystery, part social commentary and part satire. All of the Martin Beck mysteries are good and should be read in order beginning with Roseanne and ending with this book.

Rating:
Summary: The disappointing finale
Review: The tenth, and final, Martin Beck novel. A disappointing finish to an otherwise excellent series. International terrorists strike fear into the heart of Sweden, their motives obscure, their methods deadly.

The authors abandon all pretense of reality in this one, focusing on excessively heavy-handed Marxist criticism of all aspects of society. Beck's motivations and actions seem very out-of-character, the plot is ridiculous, and the writing is unusually poor. It reads like a freakish crossbreed of Tom Clancy, Kurt Vonnegut, and Frederich Engels.

If you've read the other nine books, you should probably read this one, too, but it's for die-hard fans only.

Rating:
Summary: The Day of Jackal meets Letters from the Underworld
Review: Well, Sjowall and Wahloo are trying to be Fredrick Forsyth and Fedor Dostoevsky at the same time here, and Forsyth part came out much better. There are three subplots to this book - the murder of porno director Walter Petrus, the political assasinations, and the story of young Stockholmer Rebecka Lind, loosely tying the former two together. The attempt on the life of American Senator is written out superbly, rivaling the Day of Jackal. The rest of the book is also readable, but by the end of the series Sjowall and Wahloo became quite didactic in their social commentaries, occasionally crossing into Pravda-like condemnation of the capitalist evils. Authors disenchantement with capitalism is evident in their other books also, but in Terrorists its influence is far less artful and a great measure less subtle. I still like the book but one could wish - can't he? - that this mesalliance between a crime novel and a morality play was moderated by the same literary taste the authors shown us before.