Summer Death by Mons Kallentoft

I wrote a raving review of the first novel by Mons Kallentoft to be translated into English, Midwinter Blood, and now I’ve had a similar experience with this next work. As before, his protagonist is the police superintendent, Malin Fors, a divorced woman in her 40s with a 16-year-old daughter, Tove. During most of the book, Tove and her father are off on a trip to Bali while Malin works to find a serial killer who preys on the most vulnerable young women who are about Tove’s age.

Do you remember the 1981 movie, Body Heat, with Kathleen Turner and William Hurt? That story memorably captured the essence of living in the brutal heat of a Florida summer, and Kallentoft does an equally effective job of portraying living through the hottest summer in Sweden's history. Fors and the other characters suffer from the inferno with every movement they make and their world is on fire, literally, as a forest fire rages uncontrolled near their town of Linkoping.

Once again, I’m going to avoid writing too much about the plot. Interestingly, the author more than hints at where the plot is going, but this reader was held in its grips as the story actually unfolded exactly where I thought it must. Malin agonizes about her role as a single mother and her distant relationship with her ex-husband. Chillingly, Kallentoft captures the essence of evil, violence and psychopathic thought processes. The crimes about which he writes are personal and disturbing. He introduces subjects such as the role of immigrants in a changing society and the impact of prejudices in the police force. Once again, he often writes in the first person, even as he switches from one character to another. He also created a fascinating dialogue from the perspective of the deceased victims whose spirits hang in the ethers, watching with horror as they are joined by more victims, trying to find a way to communicate with Malin to bring their killer to justice.

It’s good news that Kallentoft has two more books that are scheduled for release in 2014 and 2015. Following the seasonal theme in Midwinter Blood and Summer Death will be Autumn Sonata and Spring Remains. Considering that I got up at 3:30 in the morning in order to finish Summer Death, for me, his next two books will be must reads.