Nightblind by Ragnar Jonasson
Translated by Quentin Bates — With its unique blend of a Golden Age-style mystery and a bleak, frozen Icelandic setting, Snowblind was one of our top five debuts of 2015. Just when you thought you’d seen it all in Scandinavian crime fiction, Orenda Books released a brand…
In the Cold Dark Ground by Stuart MacBride
Logan McRae is one of the more endearing Scottish coppers who has risen to fictional fame over the last two decades. Formerly a detective sergeant, he is now in uniform again and has been banished to the bleak north coast of Aberdeenshire, away from his…
Hard Cheese by Ulf Durling
Translated by Bertil Falk — Män som hatar kvinnor (Men who hate women) became The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and Polis, polis, potatismos! (Police, police, potatoes) became Murder at the Savoy, the sixth novel in Sjöwall and Wahlöö’s Martin Beck series. In a similar way, Gammal ost (Old Cheese)…
A Taste of Ashes
Tony Black’s second DI Bob Valentine novel is set in the west coast town of Ayr. Valentine is a cop who places himself – literally – at the sharp end, as he is just returning to duty after being stabbed in the heart. He is straight…
Behind Closed Doors
Elizabeth Haynes is back with a psychological thriller. Fifteen-year-old Scarlett Rainsford disappears while on a family holiday in Rhodes, then re-appears 10 years later in her hometown, a broken young woman working in a local brothel. DCI Louisa Smith has to find out what happened, trawling…
The Defenceless
Kati Hiekkapelto’s cop Anna Fekete first featured in The Hummingird (2014) and she returns in another crime thriller which exposes the raw underbelly of Finland’s normally calm and thoughtful society. Police officer Fekete and her older colleague Esko have to fight hard to stay on…