søndag den 10. januar 2010

Håkan Nesser, En helt anden historie (2008)


Bogen er den anden i den svenske serie om Gunnar Barbarotti, den farverige vicekriminalkommissær med italienske aner. Jeg lånte den på biblioteket.

Læseren bliver kastet lige ud i morderens dagbogsoptegnelser. En selvoptaget morder med masser af underlige personlighedstræk.

”Jeg er ikke som andre mennesker. Og jeg ønsker heller ikke at være det. Hvis jeg på et eller andet tidspunkt i mit liv finder en gruppe, hvor jeg føler, at jeg hører hjemme, så betyder det, at jeg er blevet slidt ned.”

Denne dystre, afvigende person fortsætter sin beretning om en ferie i Bretagne, hvor seks svenskere tilfældigvis møder hinanden (to par og to enlige mænd), og da de opdager, at tre af dem har tilknytning til Kymlinge, er de naturligvis nødt til nærmest at sidde lårene af hinanden under resten af ferien.

En lokal, meget livlig teenagepige slutter sig til dem, og man fornemmer hurtigt, at noget lurer under overfladen. Under en udflugt til en lille klippeø går det hele galt, og tragedien rammer gruppen. Morderen iagttager med interesse, hvordan civiliserede svenskere agerer, når nogle af vilkårene fra Goldings Fluernes Herre genskabes.

Fem år efter denne ferie beslutter morderen, at han er nødt til at slå de fem andre ihjel, fordi ”handlinger skal have konsekvenser, ellers løber skabelsen af sporet.” Og da han jo ikke er som andre mennesker, skriver han hver gang et brev direkte til Barbarotti med en meddelelse om, hvem han nu vil myrde.

Jeg læste Nessers første Barbarotti-krimi, Menneske uden hund, for et par år siden, men var ikke helt klar til at overgive mig til en ny hovedperson efter så mange år med Van Veeteren. Men i denne bog er den forelskede hovedperson så fuld af menneskelighed og personlighed, at jeg har slugt fem hundrede sider uden at savne noget som helst (måske lidt nattesøvn?)

Mit helhedsindtryk: en krimi, hvor man nyder personer og miljø, og hvor man uvilkårligt sætter farten op undervejs, fordi man er nødt til at vide besked!

Håkan Nesser, A Completely Different Story.


This Swedish crime novel (Best of Swedish crime fiction 2007) is the second in Nesser´s Barbarotti series which has not been translated into English yet. But it will!

I read the first Barbarotti a couple of years ago and was not quite convinced, but this one sets out with a fabulous plot. The murderer writes a kind of diary so the reader knows immediately that we have a weird loner, somewhat like Inger Frimansson´s Justine Dalvik, who seems unable to feel much empathy.

The murderer recounts a story about six Swedish tourists who meet by accident in Bretagne (two couples and two single men), and as three of them are related to Kymlinge (Barbarotti´s home town), they obviously have to spend the rest of their holiday together. Later a local teenage girl joins them, and one feels that she has an unsettling influence on the group. They go for a trip to a small, uninhabited island, and in some kind of Lord of the Flies atmosphere, everything begins to go wrong.

Five years after this holiday the murderer decides he must kill the other Swedes, and as he is not like everybody else, he writes a letter ahead of each murder, informing Gunnar Barbarotti whom he is going to kill.

I borrow this book from the library.

My overall impression: interesting and engaging characters and environment, plus a compelling plot that made me race through five hundred pages because I had to know ...

12 kommentarer:

Maxine Clarke sagde ...

I really do hope they translate his Barbarotti series into English soon! The author talked about this series at Crime Fest and it sounds most apppealing. Thank you for your appetiser! I hope we monolinguists do not have to wait too long for the main course.

It is also quite frustrating for the reader to have to wait a year between each Van Veeteren book - so far only 4 of the 10 are translated, and they were written so long ago that the author had forgotten many of the details when he was asked about them in his interview! I understand, though, that translating and publishing has its own timescale....

Uriah Robinson sagde ...

'Not been translated into English yet' must be the cruelest words in crime fiction.
I was so intrigued by this series when Hakan nesser spoke about it at Crime Fest that I went over to Steven Murray and Tiina Nunnally and suggested they might volunteer their services as extra translators. A bit of a cheek on my part, but at one a year I might not be around for all the Van Veeterens yet alone the Barbarottis.

Elizabeth Spann Craig sagde ...

Interesting idea! So it's told through the killer's POV through the diary? Wow.

Elizabeth
Mystery Writing is Murder
Mystery Lovers’ Kitchen

Dorte H sagde ...

Maxine: I know it must be annoying to have to wait for so long. They probably don´t think they can sell more than one per author every year. As you can see, I was not quite sure about the series after the first, but this one was such a pleasure to read that I turned the pages faster and faster. The ending was also a surprise, but no more about that ;D

Norman: you have my sympathy. If I could not read novels in English ... I wish I could help, but I don´t think anyone would appreciate it (anyone but my friends, maybe) if I butted in and translated Barbarotti.

Elizabeth: it is not the whole story, but there are several sections told by the killer in diary-form. The two voices of narration worked really well and enhanced my reading experience. And somehow I think all readers enjoy getting information the police don´t have.

Anonym sagde ...

Dorte - Like Elizabeth, I'm thoroughly intrigued by the idea of a murder told from the killer's POV. I'm even more intrigued by multiple perspectives. That adds such richness to a book. I'm really hoping this series gets translated soon!

Bloggergutt sagde ...

The one per year policy (which certainly does not apply to James Peterson and some others in the US) of publishers is a policy I believe is fairly outdated. Both in Scandinavia and in German they did Stieg Larsson a lot faster with great success.

I think it is xonophobia more than a rational policy. And, let's face it, there is considerable xonophobia in the publishing industry, especially in the US. I read in the New York Times that only 4% of the books are foreign. That would mean Americans read 90% books written in a country with less than 10% of the world population. And, compared to other writers, American writers are simply not of a quality that makes that explainable in a rational world.

Peter @ scandinavianbooks.com

Anita sagde ...

The books about Barbarotti are absolutely fantastic, I have read all of them. Waiting for the next one...

betteskov sagde ...

Jeg forsøgte at kommentere på denne post i går, åbenbart forgæves (damn google-konto). Nå, men jeg kunne også godt lide denne Nesser-bog (jeg lærte Barbarotti at kende først, så savner ikke den gamle komissær så meget), selvom der måske går lige rigelig familiehygge i den. Værre end mange femi-krimier siger jeg bare... Men plottet var jo ellers uhyggeligt nok, og ret spændende, så alt i alt får den en thumbs up fra mig.
Forresten kom jeg til at tænke på, at Jussi Adler-Olsen (har godt nok kun læst en af hans bøger) godt kunne være det danske svar på Nesser. Har du læst ham?
Og så har jeg en anbefaling, der godt nok går ind i en lidt anden genre. Charlaine Harris, der skriver om vampyrer har faktisk en krimi-historie i nogle af sine bøger (Dead until Dark og Living Dead in Dallas). Var det ikke lige en gren krimibloggen kunne møves ud af - vampyrer lader til at være det de unge vil ha! ;-)

Dorte H sagde ...

Margot: yes, I think several Van Veeteren fans are waiting eagerly for more Nesser.

Hi Peter, nice to meet you!
Well, I am not here to criticize American readers, but I think ANY reader can expand his or her horizon by reading books from other continents and language areas. I am certainly happy I am not restricted to read Danish crime fiction!

Dorte H sagde ...

Anita: so am I!

Jane: never trust google (or Blogger) :)
Jo, der går da meget familiehygge & forelskelse i den, men så kan man jo bare sætte farten ekstra op. Jeg nød i hvert fald slutningen, og lod mig overraske.
Jeg har læst én af Adler-Olsen, og jeg er enig i, at den er rigtig god. Især er hans sidekick en fin fornyelse. Var det ikke Assad?

Vampyrer? Hm, vampyrer MED krimi kunne jeg måske godt overveje.

betteskov sagde ...

Nå, nu kører det jo virkelig med at kommentere! Det var nemlig Assad der gjorde Adler-Olsens krimi rigtig god, og jeg har da også bestilt hans øvrige værker på biblioteket! Det er første gang jeg har læst en dansk krimi med en person af anden etnisk oprindelse end dansk i rollen som detektiv, og det gjorde virkelig godt (nogle flere af dem, tak), især fordi bogen ikke blev helt fedtet ind i halaldebat.

Personligt er jeg helt gaga over kombinationen vampyrer og krimi. Kan det blive bedre? Ja, for det handler også om Sydstaterne! Det er nemlig Charlaine Harris bøger som ligger til grund for den geniale tv-serie True Blood, men bøgerne er lidt mere krimi-agtige. Altså, detektiven har ikke ansættelse i politiet (hun er heller ikke journalist men servitrice) og hendes redskab er en medfødt evne til telepati, så det er ikke en helt standardkrimi, vel? Men sjove og spændende, det de :-D

Dorte H sagde ...

Jane: vi er helt enige om Adler-Olsen! Jeg har lige været på biblioteket, men de havde ikke nr to på hylden, så jeg lod mig friste af noget andet.

Jeg lover at sætte Charlaine Harris på min liste, men ingen faste løfter om hvornår jeg prøver hende. Jeg har 50 ulæste krimier på hylden, deltager i to læse-udfordringer og har lige slæbt ni bøger hjem fra biblioteket.