Frozen Tracks, by Ake Edwardson

Frozen Tracks is another wonderful psychological police procedural from Ake Edwardson. Here Detective Chief Inspector Erik Winter and his team is engaged in a tough case where four college-aged men are brutally attacked from behind, leaving them with severe head trauma. The victims seem totally unconnected in their day-to-day lives and acquaintances, but the attacks continue in spite of a careful investigation into the incidents. The men are only linked by the distinctive mark left by the attacker's mysterious weapon.

At the same time, nursery school children report being lured to the car of a strange "mister", who gives them candy. However, the children appear unharmed, and the police brush off these incidents until one boy is found badly beaten in the woods. Winter in particular is alarmed by the danger as his daughter Elsa attends one of the hopelessly understaffed schools hit by this predator. And soon Erik Winter is thrown into a race to save a kidnapped boy from the clutches of a monster.

Thus the approaching Christmas is not very festive for Detective Chief Inspector Erik Winter. Instead of preparing for Christmas in Frozen Tracks – he had a plan for a holiday in the Costa del Sol with his partner Angela and daughter - he is haunted by two very puzzling and seemingly unrelated sets of crimes.

Leads followed by Winter and his colleagues and interviews with a farm raised victim, lead Winter and his team to the bleak and desolate prairies of rural Sweden when a branding iron is considered as being the assault weapon. Something sinister has happened out there, Winter can feel it in his bones.

Erik Winter is an interesting addition to the famous policemen we know and love – Martin Beck, Kurt Wallander, Inspector Konrad Sejer, Inspector Morse, and others. He is very smart, well grounded in intelligence and common sense, and he is a little bit of snob with a well developed taste for fine suits and expensive brands. Also, he is socially conscious without being depressed or borderline depressed. And the author, Ake Edwardson writes very well. Especially he is strong in characterization, they are well developed and real.

Frozen Tracks is a good, enjoyable, exciting and very readable book!

Sun and Shadow, by Ake Edwardson

Sun and Shadow is the first book that was translated into English in Ake Edwardson’s crime fiction book series about Chief Inspector Erik Winter. It is yet another of those suspenseful, crafty and excellent Swedish crime fiction novels!

The main character of the series, Erik Winter, is a very interesting character. He is a bit of a snob who loves Italian clothes and excellent food, a jazz fan and fond of cooking. He comes across as quite arrogant, especially to people who do not know him. But he is also considerate and philosophical, and the youngest policeman ever to have achieved his elevated rank in Sweden.

In Sun and Shadow we are introduced to swingers in the city of Gothenburg in Sweden. A couple entertain a stranger in their Gothenburg flat, a man who plays death metal music and doesn’t behave quite as expected. Instead of having steamy sex with the couple, he kills them and leaves their apartment with the death metal music still playing.

The dead couple is found by a young newspaper delivery boy. For more than a week he has watched his deliveries piling up behind the front door. Also, the loud music playing inside the flat seems odd and the boy contacts the police.

What greets Chief Inspector Erik Winter and his team when they arrive at the scene of the murder, appears as a grotesque stage setting. There are some clues, but they are hard to follow. Erik Winter feels that the murderer is providing them with a riddle of nightmares, of good versus evil, of sun and shadow.

Then the murderer hits again. Another couple is killed. The murder has taken place very close to Erik Winter’s home, and his pregnant girlfriend is nervous. And she is also scared by mysterious phone calls. As the investigation proceeds, it unearths a possible link between the murderer and the police force. So now even friendly faces are not to be trusted and, when the killer strikes again, Winter is in a race against time.

Sun and Shadow is excellently written and a great crime fiction novel. The translation by Laurie Thompson seems a little stilted at times. In my opinion it is a little too slow in the beginning, but many readers will probably appreciate the time and space devoted to character development and descriptions of the setting of the book. And Ake Edwardson is very good at getting into the psyche of his characters. The plot is rich and full of interesting twists. Edwardson leaves a number of clues to his readers, but even so the solution is somewhat surprising. Overall, Sun and Shadow is a well-rounded, compelling and very entertaining crime-novel.

Links to Ake Edwardson's books about Erik Winter, at Amazon US: Ake Edwardson books. Links to Amazon UK and Amazon CAN.