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Erik Maria Bark is a clinical psychiatrist and hypnotist. He suffered a traumatic experience while practicing the latter discipline and had thus vowed to never practice hypnotism again. When he breaks that vow in the Hypnotist, the consequences prove to be horrific. He aids Linna again in The Stalker, the fifth Lars Kepler Book. Jenny pauses beneath the power lines to light a cigarette, then sets off again. The buttons on the cuff of her sleeve glint in the light.
I’m not going to lie. I enjoyed this series in the past, although I still need to read books 6 & 7 (both are sitting on my shelves, unopened, but this one is a copy from the library and I couldn’t resist), but I was very disappointed with this one, especially the way they presented a case of mental health. If this was written in the 70’s (or even in the 90’s) perhaps it would be acceptable, but not nowadays, when there are so many updated studies and more understanding around the topic. She tries to get up and vomits again, hears them talking as she spits into the grass. A voice says, “She’s my daughter,” explaining that it isn’t the first time she has run away and gone on a drinking spree. The Ahndorils had wanted to use a penname for their new series as they viewed choosing a pseudonym as a way of announcing that they would be writing in a different genre and in a different voice. They chose to incorporate a tribute to Stieg Larsson in their penname Lars Kepler to signal they would be writing similarly dark crime fiction. Alexander and Alexandra also wanted to create a “filmic atmosphere” in the Lars Kepler books to make the reader feel as if they are there, watching the action. She blinks, trying to make her eyes focus, and sees that the bars are missing on the other side of the trailer, where the curtain is reinforced with five rows of sewn-in poles instead. Seventeen-year-old Jenny is abducted in broad daylight and taken to a dilapidated, isolated house where she is chained and caged along with several other girls. Their captor is unpredictable, and as wily as he is cruel: he foils every one of their desperate attempts to escape . . . and once caught, they rarely survive their punishment.
Multibuys
In fact, it's a great book, four stars just because giving a five to a detective about a maniac (if it's not "The Silence of the Lambs") is nonsense. But it's great within the genre. A married couple of beautiful Swedish writers with the same name for two, writing under the pseudonym Lars Kepler, managed to change the first negative opinion that I had with Lazarus. Detective Joona Linna is on the trail of a kidnapper who targets teenage girls and makes their worst nightmares a reality. Seventeen-year-old Jenny is abducted in broad daylight and taken to run down, isolated house where she is chained and caged along with several other girls. Their captor is unpredictable and extremely brutal in the punishment he gives out. Lying among the lumps of dry mud and dark leaves, Jenny notices a front tooth. Adrenaline surges through her. Five years later, Jenny is found dead in a public park, and the police are hitting dead ends in their efforts to find her killer. When Detective Joona Linna realises that this murder appears to have a connection to a death that was declared a suicide years before they may have their first break. Another seventeen year old goes missing and it confirms that there is a serial killer on the loose. With the police getting closer to the killer the girls being held captive are put in greater danger. It becomes a race against time to catch the killer before more lives are lost.
Etwas störend ist auch, dass die Ahndorils zwar immer wieder auf Ereignisse aus den Vorgängern anspielen oder auch bekannte Figuren in die Geschichte einbinden, dabei aber wenig Erklärungen für Leser:innen liefern, die entweder neu in die Reihe einsteigen oder nicht mehr alle Zusammenhänge parat haben. Das zeigt sich hier vor allem in der Figur von Saga Bauer, die in den Vorgängern teilweise eine große Rolle einnahm und hier nur zweimal kurz ohne Erläuterung in erschütternder Verfassung auftaucht, was im Gesamtzusammenhang ziemlich willkürlich wirkt. Eine kleine Hilfestellung wäre daher manchmal wünschenswert gewesen. Ook dit deel begint weer ontzettend spannend. Er zijn meerdere verhaallijnen en eentje daarvan is de verdwijning van Jenny, een meisje dat vijf jaar later dood wordt gevonden. Waar is ze al die tijd geweest? En wat is er precies met haar gebeurd? Er blijven meisjes verdwijnen, maar niemand weet waar ze zijn...There is enough cruelty in the "Mirror Man", but it does not give the impression of unjustifiably exaggerated, and the terrible story under the motto: "Children play - mothers look at them" really scares, causes sympathy, makes you worry. As for the audiobook, the version of the novel performed by Igor Knyazev is beautiful as always. I can't help but mention the Godfather of the local scale Stefano and the range of female images, from absolutely charming to frightening. Jenny desperately searches for some kind of logical explanation, a source of misunderstanding, but deep down she knows exactly what is happening. She is in the very situation everyone fears most. This is the kind of thing that only ever happens in horror films. A memorable beginning sets the stage for what is to come. Reading on, the suspense was high through-out most of the novel. The plot is complex and has twists and turns to keep a reader guessing. The high stakes kept me engaged throughout the story. The well-written story and the incredible characters, combined with unnerving action, culminates in an astounding conclusion. This was one well written novel with an interesting take on many things including mental illness as well as hypnosis and psychiatry and its patients in general. It doesn't obsess with these aspects but does bring out relevant and important points.
The conflicts and sense of urgency move the story forward and through some unexpected twists. The internal dialogues and the narrative pulls readers into the inner world of the characters making us unsettled, distressed, and thankful that Joona has the tenacity to keep investigating. Eleonor knows this because she once came by after she found Jenny’s missing book—a book she herself had hidden. In the end, she didn’t dare ring the doorbell, and after waiting outside for an hour, she just left it in the mailbox. Eleonor is about two hundred meters behind her on the footpath running parallel to Eriksbergs Road. Stellar…. Theability of Kepler (the pen name of Alexander and Alexandra Ahndoril) to ratchet up the tension en route to a stunning reveal and an eminently fair solution is remarkable. This merits comparisons with the best of Thomas Harris.” — Publishers Weekly (starred)The Androhils believe that Lars Kepler has a life of his own. They had attempted collaborations before, but had always wound up fighting. They have never fought when writing as Lars Kepler, and they describe the process of writing as Lars Kepler as being akin to two people playing the piano together. Some writer teams will write alternate chapters or divide the characters between them. The Androhils don’t do that, but they discuss the plots of their works all the time, so both know what they want to write. Writings This book really stayed in my mind. Like I said I questioned quite a bit about it. Things along the line of how are they going to explain this. How are they going to explain that. This really doesn't make sense and either does that. Yet it never ever came close to losing me as a reader and actually pushed me forward wanting to know those answers and as I said everything is delivered in a very convincing way.
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