Bad Blood
A Crime Novel
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
In Arne Dahl’s riveting follow-up to Misterioso, the Intercrime team is assigned the task of tracking down an American serial killer on the loose in Sweden—quietly, and as quickly as possible.
When a Swedish literary critic is found tortured to death in a janitor’s closet at Newark International Airport, the police realize that the murderer made off with the victim’s ticket and boarded a flight to Stockholm. Swedish authorities are placed on high alert, but the killer manages to slip through the customs dragnet and vanishes into the night.
With no clear motive in sight, Detectives Paul Hjelm and Kerstin Holm of Intercrime’s A-Unit take over the investigation. They learn that the method of torture used was not only a highly specialized means of extracting information secretly developed during the Vietnam War—allowing the victim to whisper, but not to scream—but also that it was the modus operandi of an allegedly deceased homicidal maniac known only as the Kentucky Killer.
As additional victims are discovered on the outskirts of Stockholm and the terror grows, the team finds itself coming up empty-handed. Hjelm and Holm fly to New York, hoping to discover both the killer’s identity and the source of his interest in Sweden. What they quickly learn, searching through the past, is that bad blood always comes back around.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
An American serial killer preoccupies Det. Paul Hjelm and his National Criminal Police colleagues in Dahl's second Intercrime novel (after 2011's Misterioso). The "Kentucky Killer," who murdered 18 people almost 15 years earlier, has within the last year struck again repeatedly. He tortured to death his latest victim, a Swedish literary critic, at New Jersey's Newark Airport. When the elaborate effort to catch the murderer as he returns to Sweden fails, the police must wait for another murder. The various team members including the captivating Kerstin Holm, who was briefly involved with Hjelm assume tasks that play to their individual strengths. The reader will find the characters even more distinctive and well defined than in the first book. The American FBI agent Ray Larner is also memorable, though the descriptions of New York City are heavy-handed. The plot heats up in New York, races back to Stockholm and environs, and skids to a fair conclusion.
