The Second Deadly Sin – Åsa Larsson

We’re back in Sweden, where the nights are dark and the winters are long and cold. Perfect conditions for crime.

In a forest in the North, the villagers band together to overcome a rampaging bear. Nothing prepares them for a grizly discovery in its stomach. In Kurravaara, a woman is murdered with frenzied and vicious brutality and her orphan grandson is missing.

Only Rebecka Martinsson sees a connection between the two events, but she’s been dropped from the case. She now stands alone against a killer motivated by a horrifying crime that still festers after a century on ice.

The Second Deadly Sin is the fifth novel to feature District Prosecutor Rebecka Martinsson: the others being Sun Storm (in the USA, The Savage Altar in the UK), The Blood Spilt, The Black Path and Until Thy Wrath Be Past. Martinsson’s personal problems have seen her return to her homeland in northern Sweden, inside the Arctic Circle. While there may be tranquility and fewer people, it’s a savage landscape where death comes in many guises. This is a novel red in tooth and claw with a vivid sense of place and a well-drawn central character.

It’s a familiar world for its creator, Asa Larsson, who lives with her family in rural Kiruna, also in the far north of Sweden. Her novel Sun Storm (aka The Savage Altar) was winner of Sweden’s Best First Crime Novel Award. And no, she isn’t related to Stieg, so don’t ask.

This may not be to everyone’s taste, but the novel has been acclaimed by fans who like their Scandinavian noir on the dark side. Just make sure you read it by the fire – with the lights on!