Scandinavian Noir

Bill Olsson, recently widowed, is desperate to provide for his daughter, Sally. Struggling to pay rent, he welcomes a lodger into their home: Karla, a law student and aspiring judge, who works as a housekeeper to make ends meet. Her clients are the Rytters, an incredibly wealthy couple who hide behind closed doors. The wife is ill and hasn’t left the house in months. The husband is controlling and obsessive. Is he just a worried husband, concerned for his wife’s health? Or is there something more sinister at play?

An in-depth and personal exploration of Scandinavian crime fiction as a way into Scandinavian culture at large.

Freelance private detective Thomas "Ravn" Ravnsholdt is attempting to move on with his life following the murder of his girlfriend. But when wealthy business mogul Ferdinand Mesmer enlists his help finding his son, Ravn reluctantly takes on what he thinks will be a straightforward missing person case. A decade ago, Jacob Mesmer founded the mysterious and scandal-scarred religious sect "God's Chosen." Now he's vanished without a trace. As Ravn digs deeper, he discovers the previous private eye assigned to the case has also disappeared.

William’s father is a beloved opera singer in Stockholm, charismatic and unpredictable. Raised in the shadow of his father’s addictions—women, drink, and cruelty—he knows the man’s dark side. William believes he’s found the light when he falls in love with a fellow university student, a young woman named Ebba. But his father’s hold on his life is not so easily broken. Even in death.

Local girls' soccer coach Sven-Gunnar Erlandsson is practically a saint in the community, known for his good works and volunteering. So when his body is found in Stockholm's beautiful Herräng forest, shot at close range in the back of the neck while walking home from a late-night poker game, the police struggle to find a motive. Nothing has been taken from his pockets except his cell phone, and the only other clues left behind are a cryptic handwritten note and a handful of playing cards.

#1 INTERNATIONAL BEST SELLER A serial killer is spinning a sinister web and Detectives Joona Linna and Saga Bauer are caught dead center. This pulse-pounding descent into the chilling world of The Spider is another shocking thriller in the Killer Instinct series. Three years ago, Detective...

An electrifying work of suspense from internationally bestselling author Katrine Engberg—heralded as a “stunning debut” by #1 New York Times bestselling author Kathy Reichs—follows two Copenhagen police detectives struggling to solve a shocking murder and stop a killer hell-bent on...

Detectives Jeppe Kørner and Anette Werner race to solve a series of sordid murders linked to some of the most vulnerable patients in a Danish hospital in this sequel to the #1 international bestseller The Tenant that is “brimming with personality, eccentric characters, and plenty of mystery...

On the day Stockholm police officer Hanna Ahlander’s personal and professional lives crash, she takes refuge at her sister’s lodge in the Swedish ski resort paradise of Åre. But it’s a brief comfort. The entire village is shaken by the sudden vanishing of a local teenage girl. Hanna can’t help but investigate, and while searching for the missing person, she lands a job with the local police department. There she joins forces with Detective Inspector Daniel Lindskog, who has been tasked with finding the girl. Their only lead: a scarf in the snow.

This “must-read for fans of Nordic noir” (BookPage, starred review) follows detectives Korner and Werner as they search for a missing teenager and uncover the web of lies that has threatened his life—and may prevent him from ever being found. When fifteen-year-old Oscar Dreyer-Hoff...

A nurse, wife and mother of two, Nina can’t say no when someone asks for help—even when she knows better. When her estranged friend Karin leaves her a key to a public locker in a Copenhagen train station, Nina gets suckered into her most dangerous project yet. Inside the locker is a suitcase, and inside the suitcase is a three-year-old boy: naked and drugged, but alive.

It’s Midsummer’s Eve, the celebration of the longest day of the year, and on Sandhamn it’s the longest party of the year. But the fun comes to a dead halt when a young reveler is murdered, a teenage girl is found drugged and dazed on the beach, and other young women vanish. So far, what links the victims is a mystery. For Nora Linde and her new boyfriend, Jonas Sköld, the crimes are personal: one of the missing girls is Wilma, Jonas’s daughter. And her disappearance could test Nora and Jonas’s relationship in ways they never expected.

Set in the gritty streets and shadowy corners of 18th-century Stockholm, The Wolf and the Watchman is a dark, masterful historical thriller where a chilling murder investigation peels back the twisted layers of a city rife with secrets, corruption, and intrigue. “The Alienist set in...

From internationally bestselling author Katrine Engberg, the series that is a “gripping addition to the Scandinavian crime fiction pantheon” (Oprah Daily) comes to a stunning conclusion as Jeppe Kørner and Anette Werner rush to untangle a long-simmering mystery before a brutal killer...

On Easter weekend, a guest at a luxury ski lodge in Åre is stabbed to death in her plush suite. She’s Charlotte Wretlind, a property developer who planned to restore a nearby mountain hotel to its long-gone glory days. It was not a random attack. It was an act of pure aggression leveled against a woman with plenty of enemies. As the murder spreads panic among tourists and Åre residents alike, Detective Inspectors Hanna Ahlander and Daniel Lindskog face a shady staff, a dogged press, and multiple suspects.

The Bucket List starts when undercover FBI Agent John Adderley wakes up in a hospital bed in Baltimore with extensive gunshot wounds. He knows he’s lucky to be alive. And just a few beds away is the man who 24 hours ago pointed a gun to his head. Soon, a high-profile cold-case file is sent to Agent Adderley, now living in Sweden (where he’s not lived since he was a boy) in witness protection, hiding until he can testify against the drug cartel he infiltrated back in the States. Adderley is determined to solve the case, even with a price on his head....

Left to her own devices, Detective Sergeant Charlie West struggles with the responsibility of a full-blown murder investigation when a man is pushed off a cliff. Not ready to have her apron strings severed so soon, West finds Munro who reluctantly agrees to shed light on the Ayrshire detectives' most challenging case yet. Once the police have discovered the identity of the dead man, and established his demise was the result of foul play, the race is on to hunt down the murderer.

A #1 international bestseller, this atmospheric and breathtaking sequel to the “cerebral, immersive page-turner” (The Washington Post) The Wolf and the Watchman explores the darkness hidden beneath the splendor of 18th-century Stockholm. Stockholm, 1794: A young nobleman, Eric Three Roses...

From Ragnar Jónasson, the award-winning author of the international bestselling Ari Thór series, The Girl Who Died is a standalone thriller about a young woman seeking a new start in a secluded village where a small community is desperate to protect its secrets. Teacher Wanted At the Edge of...

When perpetual bachelor Gunder Jomann goes to India for two weeks and comes home married, the town of Elvestad is stunned. On the day the Indian bride is supposed to arrive, the battered body of a woman is found in a meadow on the outskirts of town. None of the "good people of Elvestad" can believe that anyone among them would be capable of such a brutal murder. But in his quiet, formal way, Inspector Konrad Sejer understands that good people can commit atrocious deeds, and that no one is altogether innocent.