The Forgotten Girls

November 17, 2014
In the chilling fourth Louise Rick thriller to be published in the U.S. from Danish bestseller Blaedel (after 2012’s Farewell to Freedom), the former Copenhagen homicide detective craves a fresh start as head of the fledgling Special Search Agency, but the unit’s first case plunges her back into a nightmare she has spent decades struggling to forget. Before the body of a middle-aged woman found in the forest can be identified, a toddler’s cries lead Louise and her enigmatic new partner, Eik Nordstrøm, to a brutally slain babysitter, not far from the first corpse—the very place where a teenage Louise suffered the tragedy that would shape her life. As the dogged investigator and Eik—to whom she finds herself attracted despite his alcoholism and other issues—pursue links to a long-shuttered mental institution, it starts to look as if the past could prove key to catching a present-day monster. The swiftly moving plot and engaging core characters help make up for serviceable prose and a hard-to-swallow denouement. Author tour.

December 15, 2014
Taking charge of Copenhagen's Special Search Agency, detective Louise Rick (Farewell to Freedom, 2012, etc.) catches the case of a young woman who's been found dead more than 30 years after her death certificate was issued.Responding to a public announcement, Agnete Eskildsen, a former care assistant at the Eliselund facility for the mentally disabled, identifies the distinctively scarred woman who recently took a fatal fall as Lisemette, who was one of the young patients at Eliselund a generation ago. The complication is that Lisemette turns out to be two people, Lise Andersen and her twin sister, Mette, and that they were both pronounced dead at age 17 on the same day back in 1980. Louise's recent corpse is clearly Lise, but how can she have been alive (and having sex) until very recently-and what's become of Mette, whom the Special Search Agency no longer has any reason to assume is actually dead? Ragner Ronholt, Louise's new boss, wants her to mark the case closed now that she's identified the dead woman, and you can see why. The murder of child care provider Karin Lund has reopened the search for a rapist who may have been preying on women in the neighborhood of Hvalso ever since 23-year-old Lotte Svendsen went missing in 1991. But Louise, egged on by both her new colleague Eik Nordstrom and her old friend Camilla Lind, keeps dogging the surviving staff at Eliselund until she uncovers long-buried secrets as ugly as you could wish. This first installment of a new trilogy for Louise and the Special Search Staff is perhaps the most tightly knit of Blaedel's grim procedurals.

COPYRIGHT(2014) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

December 1, 2014
The dark secrets of a closed mental institution are revealed in this mystery by Denmark's queen of crime. Detective Louise Rick is just starting her job heading the newly established Special Search Agency when an unidentified woman is found dead in the woods. The body turns out to be that of one of two identical twins, both brain damaged at birth and from then on inseparable, who had been proclaimed dead in 1980 by the institution that housed them, where they were called forgotten girls. When a woman is found raped and murdered in the same area, Rick and colleague Eik Nordstrom must seek the perpetrator as well as the other twin. The searches are complicated by being in Rick's home area, where she is recognized as the woman whose fianc' committed suicide years earlier. Meanwhile Nordstrom, who was not Rick's choice for her team, proves his worth as chemistry flares between them. This is the first of a trilogy featuring Rick, a sharp protagonist who wrestles with her own failings and fears, in a skillfully told story that is typically dark in the manner of Nordic crime fiction.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)

September 15, 2014

She's the Danish crime queen, offering the next Det. Louise Rick/Camilla Lind title to be published here. Seeking to identify a dead woman found in the forest, Rick releases a photo to the media, which yields a call from a woman who claims the victim is one of the long-ago "forgotten girls" she once cared for at a mental hospital. Big buzz at BEA.

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 1, 2014

This is Blaedel's fourth Det. Louise Rick and journalist Camilla Lind mystery (after Farewell to Freedom) to be released in the United States, although this is actually the fifth in the series. Hoping she hasn't made a huge mistake with her career, Louise Rick now heads the new Special Search Agency, which investigates missing-person reports. The job isn't off to the best start when Louise has to retrieve her new partner Eik Nordstrom from the bar where he is passed out. Their first case is an unidentified woman found dead in a forest near where Louise grew up, and scans show the victim was mentally disabled. Heading to the forest to investigate, Louise and Eik encounter another body. As the danger mounts, the case forces Louise to confront the reasons she left her hometown while she tries to find the killer before he strikes again. VERDICT Already an international best seller, this outing by Denmark's "Queen of Crime" offers trademark Scandinavian crime fiction with a tough detective and a very grim mystery. Blaedel is incredibly talented at keeping one reading even as one wants to look away from the graphic scenes. Recommend to fans of Camilla Lackberg and Liza Marklund. [See Prepub Alert, 8/22/14.]

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.