A Hanne Wilhelmsen Novel

A small-time drug dealer is found battered to death on the outskirts of the Norwegian capital, Oslo. A young Dutchman, walking aimlessly in central Oslo covered in blood, is taken into custody but refuses to talk. When he is informed that the woman who discovered the body, Karen Borg, is a lawyer, he demands her as his defender, although her specialty is civil, not criminal, law. The young man is adamant: he will speak to Karen Borg, and to her alone.

It is only the beginning of May, but in Oslo a brutal heat wave has coincided with an alarming increase in violent crime. In the latest instance, police investigator Hanne Wilhelmsen is sent to a macabre crime scene on the outskirts of town. An abandoned shed is covered in blood. On one wall an eight-digit number is written in blood. There is no body - nor any sign of a victim. Is it a kid’s prank or foul play? Is it even human blood? As more bloody numbers are found in isolated locations throughout Oslo, Hanne’s colleague Håkon Sand makes a startling discovery: The digits correspond to the filing numbers of foreign immigrants.

In an orphanage outside Oslo, a 12-year-old boy is causing havoc. The institution’s aging director, Agnes Vestavik, sees something chilling in Olav’s eyes: sheer hatred. When Vestavik is found murdered, stabbed in the neck with a kitchen knife - with Olav nowhere to be found - the case goes to maverick investigator Hanne Wilhelmsen, recently promoted to superintendent in the Oslo police. Hanne suspects that Olav witnessed the murder and fled, and she orders an investigation of the orphanage staff. But Hanne is hopeless at delegating and sharing responsibilities....

Less than six months after taking office, the Norwegian prime minister is found dead. She has been shot in the head. But was it a politically motivated assassination or personal revenge? Hanne Wilhelmsen, chief inspector of the Norwegian police, is on leave in California, but when the death shakes the country to its core, she knows she can't remain on the sidelines of such a crucial investigation. The hunt for the prime minister's killer is complicated, intense, and grueling.

Chief Public Prosecutor Sigurd Halvorsrud's wife is found dead in front of the fireplace in the family living room. The cause of death: decapitation. Her husband, who witnessed the grisly murder and is himself covered in blood, immediately falls under suspicion, though he claims his wife's killer was Ståle Salvesen, a man he'd prosecuted years before. Detective Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen is called in to lead the investigation with her old colleague, Billy T.

When celebrity chef Brede Ziegler is discovered stabbed to death on the steps of the Oslo police headquarters, it sends a shock wave through the city's hip in-crowd. Chef Ziegler had lots of famous associates. Could the culprit be among them, or was this a random act of violence? Police investigator Billy T. takes on the case, but he is stymied by conflicting information about what kind of man Ziegler was. It seems nobody really knew him.

A train on its way to the northern reaches of Norway careens off the track during a massive blizzard, 1,222 meters above sea level. The passengers abandon the train for a nearby, century-old hotel that is practically empty except for the staff. With plenty of food and shelter from the storm, the passengers think they are safe - until one of them turns up dead. With no sign of rescue and the storm continuing to rage, retired police inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen is asked to investigate. Paralyzed by a bullet lodged in her spine, Hanne has no wish to return to police work.

On an early April afternoon, a bomb goes off in the Oslo offices of the National Council for Islam in Norway, killing 23 people. The police and security service suspect an extremist organization to be responsible for the attack, a suspicion that grows stronger when threats reach authorities of a bigger explosion planned for the celebration of the Norwegian constitution.

The final nail-biting installment in the 10-part, award-winning Hanne Wilhelmsen series from Scandinavia's most celebrated female crime writer, Anne Holt. In 2001, three-year-old Dina is killed in a tragic car accident. Not long thereafter Dina's mother dies under mysterious circumstances, and Dina's father Jonas is convicted of her murder. Now it's 2016, and the cold case ends up on the desk of Detective Henrik Holme, who tries to convince his mentor Hanne Wilhelmsen that Jonas might have been wrongly convicted.