Bookseller Jules and the Case of the Nordic Noir

“Solve the case” is a line that crops up halfway through The Butterfly House. That’s the goal of Nordic noir, and Engberg sticks to the genre tradition faithfully. The language is direct. The case is simple enough: find the killer who is dumping bodies into fountains of Copenhagen. Engberg brings us precariously close to each of the suspects. Detective Jeppe Korner has more at stake than simply finding the killer. Excellent pacing keeps us riveted and our pulse increases until the sound of our pumping heart startles us. The notion of our fragile existence hangs on every page.

Hans Rosenfeldt sets up the characters in Cry Wolf like dominoes on a table. The drug dealer who listens to Whitney Houston; the assassin who puts Villanelle from Killing Eve to shame; the car mechanic who fixes more than cars; and our detective, Hannah Wester, who carries the emotional baggage of a freight train. Rosenfeldt sets the first domino against the next. Our thrill here is watching them topple. Where they stop will be your guess until the last page. We loved this book — it’s a mixture of cat-and-mouse thriller, Nordic noir and police procedural.

Your Scandinavian noir journey begins here. Henning Mankell. End of sentence. Inspector Kurt Wallander is a classic anti-hero of a detective. The weight of our precious existence hangs on his shoulders. But with overcoat turned up and face to the wind, Wallander persists. Demons be damned and stories to be told.

Stieg Larsson’s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is your perfect Scandi noir starting point. The dynamic between all the characters will linger with you and send you directly to the second book in Larsson’s Millennium series. Further proof of the book’s lasting effect is that there are not one but two different film adaptations of the book.

If you are not familiar with Sara Blaedel’s international bestselling series featuring Detective Louise Rick, then A Harmless Lie is the perfect entry point. This is book one in a new self-contained trilogy. Let the suspense begin! We’re jealous of anyone getting to read Blaedel for the first time.

Nordic noir doesn’t get much better than in the work of the writing duo, Alexandra Coelho Ahndoril and Alexander Ahndoril, known as Lars Kepler. This is the 7th book in the Joona Linna series which are masterful thrillers with terrifying villains and heart-pounding suspense.

Sometimes a filmmaker is a detective at heart and curiosity brings out their inner sleuth. Here, Camilla Sten’s Alice Lindstedt takes us on a dark journey. Scandinavian noir at its finest.

The premise in Jónasson’s latest novel is very direct. Four friends seek shelter in a small, abandoned hunting lodge as a deadly snowstorm hits. However, it’s not the snowstorm they have to worry about. Instead, it’s the group dynamics of the four friends as well as their past — and … something … out there … watching them.

Helene Tursten’s Snowdrift is a careful and methodical build to the point where the detective meets “her match.” It’s a grey area in which Detective Inspector Embla Nyström walks into. Tursten is deft at setting up several of those moments. No spoiler alerts here, but know it’s a great time seeing one encounter, a nail-biter on another, and an emotional gut-punch for a third. Who says a Nordic noir should “only” be chilly?

This was our first entry to the world of Jo Nesbo — by no means the first in the series, but the first to make an impact in the US. If you are looking for one of the most intense of Nordic Noirs, then begin here. The scenes are so unforgettable that you’ll be afraid to watch the film version. You’ll want to look away, but you’ll keep looking into that dark night.

In true horror tradition, that which is scary isn’t the monster itself. In detective fiction, we must go through the darkness with the main character. Seeck paces out Jessica Niemi’s pursuit of a serial killer at a breakneck speed, all balanced by Niemi’s backstory. Her origins, the things that motivate her and her secrets are all carefully meted out in such a way that we become even more involved in the story. Current story and backstory align as we head into the final chapters of the book. It’s an exhilarating journey.