The treacherous net

Review by Booklist Review

Detective Inspector Irene Huss of the Göteborg, Sweden, Police Department has her hands full. Demanding most of her attention is a serial killer using social media to find lonely young teenagers. The killer is smart, using nearly untraceable public Wi-Fi to connect with the girls. But as she's demonstrated in previous cases (The Beige Man, 2015), Huss is indefatigable, though she could use more support from her new superintendent, a canny female administrator who seems to be playing favorites with the male staff. Her old boss, Sven Andersson, now working cold cases, is currently tackling the decades-old murder of a man whose corpse was recently unearthed after an apartment-house demolition. Fans of the big-name Scandinavian crime-fiction writers (Mankell, Larsson, Nesbo) will be delighted to discover there are already eight books in Tursten's intriguing series.--Keefe, Karen Copyright 2015 Booklist

From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.

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Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

In Tursten's assured eighth novel featuring Det. Insp. Irene Huss (after The Beige Man), two teenage girls without any history of trouble go missing and later turn up as mutilated corpses. As gruesome as the murders are, what rattles Huss and her Gothenburg police colleagues is the realization that the girls are wearing two parts of the same bikini set. If these crimes are linked, could there be a serial killer stalking other girls? Meanwhile, workers discover a mummified corpse in the wall of a building being demolished. Huss's new boss, Supt. Efva Thylqvist, unloads the old corpse case onto Huss's previous boss, Supt. Sven Andersson, but she's determined to ignore Huss. It takes all of Huss's hard-earned skills to maneuver Thylqvist into allowing her to mount an aggressive operation to catch the killer. Andersson's lower-stakes pursuit of the mummy mystery provides a welcome change of pace from Huss's investigation as it builds to a nail-biting climax. (Dec.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

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Review by Library Journal Review

In the latest series installment (after The Beige Man), the already overworked Violent Crimes Unit of the Göteborg Police Department is handed two murder cases when the naked bodies of two teenage girls are found in remote areas outside the city. Crime scene evidence suggests that this may be the work of a serial killer, and Huss and her team turn to the Internet to explore the online world of pedophiles. Complicating the investigation is a personality conflict between Huss and the new female superintendent. On its own this would make an absorbing, albeit disturbing story. For some reason the author decided to add a distracting, unrelated cold-case murder to the plot. Also there is some dated-sounding dialog about computers and cell phones, which probably has to do with the original Swedish version having been written seven years ago. VERDICT Fans of Tursten's series and of Swedish crime fiction in general will enjoy this novel if they can overlook its shortcomings.-John Napp, Univ. of Toledo, OH © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

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Review by Kirkus Book Review

Gteborg's Violent Crimes Unit never has a nice day. But this summer they're especially hard-pressed by diminishing numbers and a caseload that's soared a lot faster than Swedish temperatures. Hardly have detective inspectors Irene Huss and Jonny Blom, already shaken by a rash of violence between feuding biker gangs, taken on the case of Alexandra Hallwiin, 14, who was found strangled five days after she went missing, than an enterprising dog finds a sadly similar victim in the woods. Fifteen-year-old Moa Olsson, who was killed shortly before Alexandra, stands out for her surprisingly expensive taste in clothes and accessories. Forensic evidence leaves little doubt that the two girls were murdered by the same sex killer, a man who assumed a series of false identities to befriend them online. But Irene's new boss, Superintendent Efva Thylqvist, seems unwilling to let Irene join Jonny in working Alexandra's death. The boss has problems of her own: Inspector Birgitta Mosberg-Rauhala remains out on leave while she's pursuing a law degree, and the discovery of a corpse in a building that's being demolished after a fire threatens to tax the Violent Crimes Unit to its limit. Even worse, the mummified corpse, once it's identified as that of Mats Persson, who vanished in 1983, is linked to a series of crimes that go back as far as 1940. Will the VCU ever emerge from these two investigations to see the light of day again? The case reaching back in time is considerably more tangled and less urgent than the one that points disquietingly toward the future, threatening to claim new victims. Through it all, DI Irene Huss remains appealingly unflappable under pressure. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

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The witness who called the police at 9:14 a.m. had been right. There was a dead body at the water's edge. The technicians had quickly gone out to Nötsund to secure the scene. After two hours' intensive work they were done, and the corpse could be removed and placed in a body bag.      Detective Inspectors Irene Huss and Jonny Blom waited patiently. Then Irene carefully examined the puffy grey face before zipping up the bag.     "Alexandra Hallwiin," she said in a resigned tone of voice.     They had suspected as much, but it still felt ineffably sad to be able to confirm that the girl was dead. They hadn't been involved in the case while the girl had simply been listed as a missing person, but as soon as the call had come in about the discovery at Nötsund, along with the information that the body was that of a young girl, they had printed out the available case notes. Jonny Blom drove while Irene read aloud.     Fourteen-year-old Alexandra had been missing for five days. According to her parents she had never shown any signs of wanting to run away, nor had she had any reason to do so now. They described her as a typical horse-crazy teenager--a little shy, perhaps. Hardworking at school, but no indication of bullying. Alexandra's teachers and school friends had backed up her parents' view of their daughter.     Alexandra's face had been all over the front pages over the weekend. She came from a well-off family, and kidnapping had been a possibility right from the start. If she hadn't been abducted, the police still suspected that a crime lay behind her disappearance. A girl who just wants to get away for a while usually tries to take some clothes and money with her, but according to her mother the only thing Alexandra had taken before she went missing on Walpurgis Night, April 30, was a wallet containing her bus pass and three hundred kronor at the most, the clothes she was wearing, a telescopic umbrella and her cell phone. Nothing else.     Alexandra had told her parents she was meeting some of her classmates in Brunnsparken. In spite of the pouring rain, they were going to see the Chalmers University of Technology's traditional annual parade, known as the Cortège. Then they were heading back to Torslanda to hang out at the home of one of the girls. She would be home by midnight at the latest. Her parents were going to a party with friends and didn't have time to give her a lift, so Alexandra said she would catch the bus into town. When she waved goodbye and walked out through the door, that was the last time anyone was known to have seen her alive.     The 6:05 p.m. bus had been full, and the driver didn't remember her. The driver on the next bus hadn't noticed her either. There were lots of young people heading into the city center to watch the parade and celebrate.     None of her friends had arranged to meet her in the park. Even the two girls who were regarded as Alexandra's closest friends had no idea what she was planning to do on Walpurgis Night. When they had asked Alexandra about her plans the previous day, she had said she would be training Prince in preparation for the show on Sunday. Since they knew how important the horse and competitions were to Alexandra, neither of them had pursued the matter.     No one could say for certain whether the girl had traveled into town on the bus. When her worried mother had started calling her cell phone after midnight, it had been switched off.     From the moment Alexandra closed the garden gate, it was as if the ground had opened up and swallowed her.     Now they had found her. It was a Labrador that discovered her. He was young and playful, and at first he was delighted to find a friend who had hidden herself so cleverly. A second later his sensitive nose registered a strange smell. Exciting, acrid, and a little bit frightening. He began to bark agitatedly, sticking his rump in the air as he circled the interesting odor, gradually getting closer. When his master called him--"Elroy! Elroy! Here boy!"--he grabbed a scrap of fabric that was lying on the ground and proudly scampered back with it in his mouth. There was a brief struggle, but eventually Elroy let go of his trophy. The man shuddered when he looked down at the torn, bloodied black lace thong in his hands. The word sunday was embroidered on the small triangle at the front, surrounded by a border of red rosebuds.     The body had been pushed into a crevice in the rocks; the murderer had piled a few branches and stones on top in an attempt to hide it. "So it's only the beginning of May, and we've already had our murdered teenage girl of the summer. Along with another one, just to be on the safe side. On the same day," Detective Inspector Jonny Blom said with a sigh.     His colleagues nodded with an air of resignation. Two murders at the same time meant a heavy workload for the team, particularly in view of the fact that the gang war in the city had begun to escalate once more. It had been relatively calm on that front during February and most of March, but over the Easter weekend they had launched two murder investigations within three days. The victims were a thirty-four-year-old father of three, and a twenty-three-year-old rookie. Both had belonged to the warring factions: the criminal network known as Asir, and the notorious biker gang Bandidos.     The investigation also covered a car bomb, although only minor injuries were reported. The car had belonged to a would-be gangster who carried out his activities using the restaurant he owned as a front. Presumably he hadn't been willing to pay the price for the protection of one of the gangs, although it wasn't clear which one. Those who are willingly or unwillingly drawn into dealings with the biker gangs never talk to the police. Most people have a certain instinct for self-preservation. At the moment Asir and Bandidos were equal, with one loss each. The question wasn't if reprisals would follow, but when. And which of them would strike first.     Irene Huss was only half-listening. She couldn't get the image of Alexandra's dead body out of her mind. When she had looked at the girl's face she had noticed something that was later confirmed by the preliminary autopsy report: some kind of plastic twine had been pulled tightly around her neck. A thin washing line, perhaps. There was no doubt that they were dealing with a homicide. Excerpted from The Treacherous Net by Helene Tursten All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.

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