Borkmann's Point

Starred review from July 25, 2011
Simon Vance, who narrated Stieg Larsson's Millennium Trilogy, is currently the go-to reader for Scandinavian crime novelsâand with good reason. His audio version of Nesser's well-crafted whodunit is nothing short of stellar. Along with Vance's mastery of Swedish accents, excellent pacing, and ability to capture a book's mood, his voice has the timber and confidence of a natural storyteller. The vacation of Stockholm's chief inspector Van Veeteren is interrupted by a series of ax murders in a nearby village. When a new victim turns up and the town's smartest policewoman goes missing, the seemingly remote but oddly fascinating detective takes over the case from an agreeable local police chief who's only days from retirement. The characters have depth and the plot has all the necessary ingredientsâincluding a race against timeâto satisfy even the most selective mystery fan. Vance's winning narration is the perfect icing on a very tasty cake. A Vintage paperback.

April 1, 2006
The second murder in two months by the Axman -who kills with a single blow to the back of his victim -s neck, nearly severing the head -brings intuitive Chief Inspector Van Veeteren from his seaside holiday to Kaalbringen, Sweden, where about-to-retire Chief of Police Bausen welcomes his help. When there -s a third murder less than two weeks later, police are no closer to solving the crimes. Then policewoman Beate Moerk, who has a -bizarre - idea about the killer, disB-appears, perhaps to become the Axman -s fourth victim. With the introspective Van Veeteren at its core, this is a stylish, atmospheric police procedural, dealing with issues of evil and retribution and comparing life to a chess game. Nesser received the Swedish Academy of Detection -s best novel award in 1994 for this book, which is exceptional for its elegance of prose and plot.

Copyright 2006 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Starred review from April 1, 2006
In the 10 years since the appearance of the first Henning Mankell novel in the U.S., Scandinavian crime writers have been arriving on these shores in steadily escalating numbers. The invasion continues with the U.S. debut of the internationally acclaimed Nesser. Like Mankell's Kurt Wallander, Nesser's Chief Inspector Van Veeteren is certainly world weary, the horrors of twenty-first-century crime weighing heavily on his twentieth-century shoulders, but there is also more than a little Maigret in the Stockholm sleuth. Both sides of his personality are on view here, as Van Veeteren is called away from vacation to help out in distant Kaalbringen, where an ax-wielding serial killer appears to be on the loose. Relying on intuition and charm, the inspector slowly ingratiates himself with the residents of the insular community and bumbles toward a solution, much in the manner of Commissaire Adamsberg, another Maigret descendant, in Fred Vargas' Paris-set " Have Mercy on Us All "(2005), also a late--arriving U.S. debut from a European mystery star. No reader of hard-boiled crime fiction should miss the Scandinavians, and Nesser immediately vaults to near-Mankell status. Let's hope " Borkmann's Point," which won the Swedish Crime Writers' Best Novel Award for 1994, is only the first of a steady stream of Nesser imports.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2006, American Library Association.)