The Hand that Trembles

June 20, 2011
Ann Lindell pursues a number of curious crimes in Eriksson's subtly wrought fourth mystery to be published in the U.S. featuring the Uppsala homicide detective (after The Demon of Dakar). In 1998, Sven-Arne Persson, a powerful county commissioner, left in the middle of a meeting, never to be seen again in Sweden. Twelve years later, while living under an assumed name in Bangalore, India, Persson is recognized by Jan Svensk, a former neighbor there on business. Svensk relays the news to his own parents in Sweden, acquaintances of Persson's wife, starting a destructive spiral that soon involves Lindell. Lindell unofficially pokes around the Persson incident, but she has other, fresher cases on her mind, in particular a woman's foot washed ashore outside the town of Ãregrund. While interviewing the area's strange residents, Lindell realizes several of them had means and opportunity for murder, but motive is trickier. Eriksson skillfully weaves his myriad plot threads in this fine example of Swedish noir.