Inspector Vaara

The first book of James Thompson’s Inspector Vaara series won immediate critical acclaim for a sterling tale set in the brutal cold and soul-testing isolation of kaamos, Finland’s two weeks of utter darkness. Even as the unrelenting winter conditions tighten their grip on the residents of the Lapland town, a lovely Somali movie star is found murdered, a racial slur cut into her chest.

The follow-up finds Vaara dealing with personal demons and banishment to the graveyard shift in Helsinki’s homicide unit. Thrust into the investigation of a World War II hero and the murder of a Russian businessman’s wife, Vaara is about to find that the past has a deadly reach indeed.

From the introduction by James Thompson: Finland, the myths and truths. Internationally, it has a reputation as perhaps the best place in the world to live. A great economy. A low crime rate. Good and nearly cost-free health care. The needy are provided for by the state and live in reasonable comfort. Finns: peaceful and quiet people, living in the perfect example of a social democracy functioning as it should. A tourist, or even a person who has lived here for a length of time, might well view Finland as such.