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Learn moreIn the penultimate installment of this masterful crime-fiction series, Martin Beck, now head of the National Murder Squad, is called in to a sleepy part of the countryside to investigate a woman’s disappearance. What Beck doesn’t know is that the woman has already been murdered, her body dumped in a swamp. At the same time, a midnight shoot-out between three cops and two teenage boys ends with one policeman dead.
As Beck and his partner, Lennart Kollberg, investigate both cases, they encounter two figures from their earlier cases. Folke Bengtsson, the convicted killer from the first novel of the series (Roseanna), has been recently released. Since that murder shared many characteristics with Beck’s present case, Beck comes under pressure to arrest Bengtsson. But Beck has begun to doubt that Bengtsson was guilty of any murder at all.
Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö, wife and husband team, wrote ten Martin Beck mysteries, virtually creating the modern police procedural. In addition to the many short stories and novels he wrote, Mr. Wahlöö, who died in 1975, wrote numerous radio and television plays and was a reporter for several Swedish newspapers and magazines. Maj Sjöwall is also a journalist and poet. She lives in Sweden.
Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö, wife and husband team, wrote ten Martin Beck mysteries, virtually creating the modern police procedural. In addition to the many short stories and novels he wrote, Mr. Wahlöö, who died in 1975, wrote numerous radio and television plays and was a reporter for several Swedish newspapers and magazines. Maj Sjöwall is also a journalist and poet. She lives in Sweden.
Tom Weiner, a dialogue director and voice artist best known for his roles in video games and television shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Transformers, is the winner of eight Earphones Awards and Audie Award finalist. He is a former member of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.
Thomas Teal has translated many works into English, beginning in the 1970s with The Summer Book and Sun City and more recently The True Deceiver and Fair Play. He also cotranslated Tove Jansson’s short stories in The Woman Who Borrowed Memories. He lives in Massachusetts.
Reviews
“Lively, stylistically taut…Sjöwall and Wahlöö changed the genre.”
“One of the most authentic, gripping, and profound collections of police procedurals ever accomplished…Beautifully structured, textured, and rendered.”
“Ingenious…Their mysteries don’t just read well; they reread even better…The writing is lean, with mournful undertones.”
“Tom Weiner sets the proper pace in covering the authors’ typically well-constructed, lively story, but he’s also very careful to complement the authenticity and dimension of their character portrayals, specifically that of Beck. Weiner adds a sadness and some edgy impatience to the inspector’s world-weariness, as well as a palpable longing for the woman waiting at home in Stockholm. But he makes smart audio choices for all of the characters, from the excessively jovial local lawman to the glum main suspect, a convicted killer whose capture formed the basis for Beck’s first recorded case, Roseanne.”
“Veteran voice artist Tom Weiner does his usual excellent job narrating this series, the entirety of which is available from Blackstone Audio. Highly recommended."
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