She's heavily pregnant & reveals that Halland had been renting a room in her apartment for some time. Halland's sister's foster daughter, Pernille, arrives. Her other neighbour, Inger, is kind & leaves casseroles on the doorstep but Bess doesn't seem to be able to make the appropriate responses to other people's grief & questions. Bess takes long walks & keeps bumping into a mysterious stranger who turns out to be staying with her neighbour, Brandt. His laptop & a lot of his papers are missing & the detective, Funder, is full of questions that she can't answer. She discovers two keys on his keyring & has no idea what they are for. Now that Halland is dead, Bess discovers that he had secrets. Her study is the only place she feels at peace, surrounded by her belongings. Bess feels like a guest in Halland's house, even after such a long time. She also regretted the loss of her daughter as Abby hasn't spoken to Bess since she left. He was older than she was &, although she loved him, she never felt completely comfortable in the relationship. Bess had left her husband, Troels, & daughter, Abby, after meeting Halland in a bookshop 10 years ago. Halland was leaving the house early anyway & what Bess thought was the bang of the front door as he left was actually the shot that killed him.īess & Halland's relationship is gradually revealed as Bess sits in the house trying to comprehend what has happened. Bess is numb & uncomprehending as she had spent the night working in the study & had fallen asleep at her desk.
Detectives arrive & soon seem to discount Bess as the shot was from a rifle fired some distance away. Bess is initially suspected of the murder as Halland's last words, heard by the man who found him, sounded like "My wife has shot me". The Murder of Halland is the story of Bess who wakes one morning to be told that her partner, Halland, has been found murdered in the square just outside their house. The prize is given to an established writer & Pia Juul has been published for over 30 years, writing poetry & short stories as well as novels. The Murder of Halland won the Danske Banks Litteraturpris in 2009. Pia Juul is a prize winning writer in Denmark.
I am a fan of Danish television though & loved The Eagle, Unit One &, more recently, Borgen. However, Simon's review was so enticing that I was quick to get hold of a copy. I haven't read much Scandinavian crime fiction as I have an impression that it's quite brutal & edgy, full of serial killers in remote locations & I like my crime a little softer than that. I read about The Murder of Halland on Savidge Reads earlier this year & was immediately intrigued.
0 kommentar(er)
