The Black Path
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4.2 • 79 Ratings
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
A grisly torture-murder, a haunting northern Sweden backdrop, and a dark drama of twisted sexuality collide in this masterpiece of suspense from the award-winning author of The Blood Split.
“Åsa Larsson is as deft at writing heart-stopping scenes . . . as she is at getting inside the heads of characters.”—The Washington Post
The dead woman was found on a frozen lake, her body riddled with evidence of torture. Instantly, Inspector Anna-Maria Mella knows she needs help. Because the dead woman—found in workout clothes with lacy underwear beneath them—was a key player in a mining company whose tentacles reach across the globe. Anna-Maria needs a lawyer to help explain some things—and she knows one of the best.
Attorney Rebecka Martinsson is desperate to get back to work, to feel alive again after a case that almost destroyed her. Soon Rebecka is prying into the affairs of the dead woman’s boss, the founder of Kallis Mining, whose relationship with his star employee was both complex and ominous. But what Rebecka and Anna-Maria are about to uncover—a tangled drama of secrets, perversion, and criminality—will lay bare a tale as shocking as it is sad . . . about a man’s obsession, a woman’s lonely death, and a killer’s cold, cold heart.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Swedish author Larsson's superb, gut-wrenching police procedural, Insp. Anna-Maria Mella and her longtime partner, Sven-Erik St lnacke, investigate the brutal torture-murder of Inna Wattrang, head of information for Kallis Mining, whose body is found in an ark, a small cabin on runners, on a frozen lake. The paucity of clues leads the inspector to take the unconventional step of recruiting a new prosecutor, Rebecka Martinsson, to the team. Martinsson's single-minded devotion to her work is of great benefit to Mella, whose inquiries into the self-made founder of Kallis as well as the victim's brother lead her to believe that the motive for the brutal crime stems from Kallis Mining's unscrupulous business practices. While the plot offers little mystery, this intelligent thriller carries tremendous emotional heft and makes Swedish society easily comprehensible to an American reader. Larsson's debut, Sunstorm (2003), was named Sweden's Best First Crime Novel of the Year.
Customer Reviews
A good read
A compelling story on a number of levels. Gruesome as you might expect from Larsson. Too many sub plots, but you don't lose track of the characters. 4 stars instead of five because some of the plots make the book seem padded. Good characters, plot and larger narrative. The middle seemed to slow down, but glad I finished it.
The Black Path
It was hard to put this book down. It drags in middle and is too long but you want to stay until the end and you care for the characters. Silverswan