As much as I’ve enjoyed two of Mankell’s books, this was not such a good read. The best part was that he got involved in an intrigue in Riga, Latvia, a place that I had never read about before. I don’t remember another international spy/crime scene intrigue novel that landed in Latvia. Beyond that, the book at little to offer. Kurt Wallander, the police detective from Ystad, Sweden, was called to the scene of a double murder. Two bodies had washed up on shore in a life raft, and it was eventually determined that the life raft had originated from a clandestine shipment to Riga. In the process of doing this investigation behind the still evolving political situation in Latvia, Wallander’s main contact in the police force there was murdered, and then he inexplicably fell in love with the wife of the murdered cop. There are good guys and bad guys in Latvia who are trying to manipulate the investigation because it involves the bigger matter of smuggling goods and drugs into the country, but it is almost impossible to know who the good guys are. The whole plot was loose and did not hold together well, did not make much sense, so it was not a gripping story. I’ll probably read Mankell again, but this story was a disappointment.
No comments:
Post a Comment