#BookReview Annars skjuter jägaren mig (I Am Your Judge) by Nele Neuhaus @NeleNeuhaus @albertbonniers (SWE/ENG)

Annars skjuter jägaren mig by Nele Neuhaus
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

SWEDISH REVIEW

Bröllopsresan är planerad över jul och nyår. Äntligen ska kriminalinspektör Pia Kirchhoff, hemligt nygift, få sin välförtjänta semester. Men dagarna innan resan nås hon av ett telefonsamtal som får planerna att gå om intet. I det lilla samhället Eschborn utanför Frankfurt har en äldre kvinna skjutits ihjäl av en okänd gärningsman. Kort därpå inträffar ytterligare ett liknande mord: en kvinna skjuts ihjäl genom köksfönstret. Inget av offren hade några fiender. Varför måste just de dö? Trycket på utredningen ökar snabbt. Pia Kirchhoff och hennes chef Oliver von Bodenstein söker efter en mördare som tycks välja sina offer godtyckligt – och de kommer en mänsklig tragedi på spåren.

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ANNARS SKJUTER JÄGAREN MIG är den senaste boken utgiven i Nele Neuhaus serie om poliserna Oliver von Bodenstein och Pia Kirchhoff. Innan jag började läsa denna bok så tog jag mig an de två tidigare publicerade böckerna och de var fantastiska. Först var jag lite förbryllad över vissa saker när jag läste SNÖVIT MÅSTE DÖ. Men så kollade jag upp boken och såg att de första böckerna har inte publicerats på svenska och att SNÖVIT MÅSTE DÖ är bok nummer fyra i serien. Det förklarade så mycket. Nu hoppas jag att de tidigare böckerna kommer på svenska en vacker dag.

ANNARS SKJUTER JÄGAREN MIG är en grymt bra kriminalare. Skytten verkar inte ha något som helst motiv när han skjuter människor och det lamslår hela staden. Oliver von Bodenstein och Pia Kirchhoff försöker få fram något som binder offren tillsammans samtidigt som pressen att lösa fallet ökar varje dag. När som helst kan någon ny människa falla offer.

Nele Neuhaus har klivit rakt in i min lista på favoritförfattare. Jag bara älskar hennes böcker. De tre jag har läst har alla hållit samma höga kvalité och jag är imponerade över hur hon lyckas få till berättelserna varje gång på ett så sätt att man misstänker ett flertal personer. Jag blev så förtjust i serien att jag beställde den enda bok jag kunde få tag på på Engelska, The Ice Queen, bok tre i serien. Nu hoppas jag bara att fler böcker i Bodenstein & Kirchhoff serien kommer att översättas till svenska eller engelska. Skulle inte heller ha något emot att se böckerna som film.

Tack till Albert Bonniers Förlag för recensionsexemplaret!

ENGLISH REVIEW

Police Detective Pia Kirchhoff is about to leave on her long-delayed honeymoon when she receives a phone call. An elderly woman has been shot and killed while walking her dog. A short while later another murder is committed and the modus operandi is eerily similar - a woman is killed by a bullet that smashes through her kitchen window ... and in both cases the same weapon fired the shot. Two more murders follow in short order. None of the victims had enemies and no one knows why they were singled out. As fear of the Taunus Sniper grows among the local residents, the pressure rises on Detective Kirchhoff. She and her partner, Oliver von Bodenstein, search for a suspect who appears to murder at will, but as the investigation progresses, the police officers uncover a human tragedy.

I am Your Judge is tightly plotted, and delivers surprise twists at every turn with a story that is ripped from the headlines.

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I AM YOUR JUDGE is the latest book published here in Sweden. It's the seventh book in the Bodenstein & Kirchhoff series. Before I started to read this book, did I take on the two previously published (Swedish) books and they were fabulous. I was at first a bit confused when I read SNOW WHITE MUST DIE. It felt like I started to read a story in the middle, liked I had missed the beginning. However, I learned that this was because SNOW WHITE MUST DIE is book four. The first three books haven't been published in Sweden. It explained a lot. I hope to see them published in Swedish some day.

I AM YOUR JUDGE is a fantastic crime novel. We have lone gunman that seems to kill people without any rhyme or reason. He just shoots people and the citizens in the city are afraid to go out. Oliver von Bodenstein and Pia Kirchhoff are working hard to find something that binds the people killed together. They are under a lot of stress. Any day can someone new be shot.

Nele Neuhaus has stepped right into my list of favorite authors. I just love her books. All the books I have read so far (three) has held the same high standard and I'm impressed how she managed to write the stories in such a way that I always suspect a lot of people. I was so thrilled with the books that I ordered the only book I could find translated into English that I had yet to read. And that's THE ICE QUEEN, book three in the series. I hope more books will be translated into Swedish or English. I wouldn't mind either to see the books turned into movies or mini-series.

Thanks to Albert Bonniers Förlag for the review copy!

#BookReview Bad Wolf by Nele Neuhaus @NeleNeuhaus @MinotaurBooks @StMartinsPress

Bad Wolf by Nele Neuhaus
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

She looked at herself in the mirror, touched her fingertips to the little red hood on her head, and laughed. The dress was a real dirndl, with a short skirt and apron. Papa had plaited her hair into two braids, and she really looked exactly like Little Red Riding Hood in her fairy-tale book.

He always brought presents—it was a secret that she and Papa shared, because he never brought anything for the others. Only for her. She was his favorite.

The door opened, and she uttered a frightened cry when she saw the wolf. But then she had to laugh. It wasn’t a real wolf after all; it was only Papa, who had put on a costume. How lovely it was that she was the only one to share this secret with Papa. Too bad she could never remember anything afterward.

On a hot June day, the body of a sixteen-year-old girl washes up on a riverbank outside of Frankfurt. She has been brutally murdered and shows signs of long-term abuse, but no one comes forward with any information as to her identity. Even weeks later, the local police have not been able to find out who she is. Then a new case comes in: A popular television host is attacked, raped, and locked in the trunk of her own car. She survives, barely, and is able to supply only vague hints to the police, having to do with her recent investigations into an organization whose members are from the highest echelons of society, and the potential uncovering of a shocking history they’d prefer to keep from the public eye. 

As the two cases collide, Inspectors Pia Kirchhoff and Oliver von Bodenstein dig deep into the past and underneath the veneer of bourgeois society to come up against a terrible secret that is about to impact their personal lives as well. It is almost too late for a person very close to Pia before she and Oliver finally track down the big bad wolf...

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If there is one series that I wholeheartedly recommend reading if you are a fan of crime novels is it this one. I simply adore the Bodenstein & Kirchhoff books. So far, have I read 3 books, and all of them are 5-star books. This is the second book I read. The only sad thing is that not all the books are translated into English (nor Swedish). However, Lucky me have one more unread book to read, THE ICE QUEEN!

What I loved about the first book I read, SNOW WHITE MUST DIE, was that there was so much going on. Both when it comes to the case as Pia Kirchhoff and Oliver von Bodenstein private lives. The same thing can I say about BAD WOLF. I'm always intrigued by stories that take a while before you started to see a pattern. Like a puzzle, you slowly start to put the pieces together and as the story progresses you start to realize the truth. In this case, you have quite early one a feeling of dread.

BAD WOLF is a fantastic crime novel. Nele Neuhaus has such a fabulous ability to write that I get so engrossed in what is going on that I just devour her books. I found this book to be a bit hard to read, not because of the writing, but because of the subject. 

It's not the monster under the bed that is frightening, it's the one walking in plain sight out in the sun. It's the bad wolf that is hiding in plain sight that we should be wary of...    

#BookReview Snow White Must Die by Nele Neuhaus @NeleNeuhaus @MinotaurBooks @StMartinsPress

Snow White Must Die by Nele Neuhaus
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

On a rainy November day police detectives Pia Kirchhoff and Oliver von Bodenstein are summoned to a mysterious traffic accident: A woman has fallen from a pedestrian bridge onto a car driving underneath. According to a witness, the woman may have been pushed. The investigation leads Pia and Oliver to a small village, and the home of the victim, Rita Cramer.

On a September evening eleven years earlier, two seventeen-year-old girls vanished from the village without a trace. In a trial based only on circumstantial evidence, twenty-year-old Tobias Sartorius, Rita Cramer's son, was sentenced to ten years in prison. Bodenstein and Kirchhoff discover that Tobias, after serving his sentence, has now returned to his home town. Did the attack on his mother have something to do with his return?

In the village, Pia and Oliver encounter a wall of silence. When another young girl disappears, the events of the past seem to be repeating themselves in a disastrous manner. The investigation turns into a race against time, because for the villagers it is soon clear who the perpetrator is—and this time they are determined to take matters into their own hands.

An atmospheric, character-driven and suspenseful mystery set in a small town that could be anywhere, dealing with issues of gossip, power, and keeping up appearances.

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WOW! What an absolutely stunning thriller! I had planned to read the latest book published here in Sweden (I AM YOUR JUDGE), but before that did I want to read the ones published in Swedish first. I was a bit confused at first before I realized that this actually is books four in the series. Which explained why it felt like you have missed a lot in the characters personal life (and cases they discussed in the book). Personally, would I have loved to read the books from the beginning, but I'm still thrilled to have discovered this series.

SNOW WHITE MUST DIE is a captivating crime novel. I liked the main characters Pia Kirchhoff and Oliver von Bodenstein right from the start and I especially loved getting to know more about their personal lives. I felt that giving Pia and Oliver such rich personal lives really gave them depth, not to mention how interesting it was to read about Pia and her partner (he was a suspect in a case when they first met) and Oliver and his what he thinks "happy" marriage.

As for the case, there were many characters to keep track off. That is the hard part of the book, but I never really felt that it bothered me much. I was so engrossed in the case. Wanting to know more about what happened to the two young women that disappeared years ago. Could this case have something to do with the woman that fell from the bridge? Cold cases are my favorite kind of crime novels and I love reading about small towns with many secrets. There were moments when it felt like everyone was hiding something...

SNOW WHITE MUST DIE is a splendid book and it was easy to give it five stars! This is a series that I recommend with all my heart!