I've been reading the Harry Hole detective series in order, and this is the third. I liked the first, The Bat, a lot. I liked the second, Cockroaches (my review) less. I liked this one about as much as Cockroaches. I've bought the next two, so I'll read at least one more.

In this one, the story is complicated. The complications come from a double-story structure, with a significant backstory taking place during World War II, when a lot of Norwegians volunteered to fight WITH the Nazis. We're in the trenches with a few Norwegian soldiers who then figure prominently in Harry's present-day case, concerning present-day murders in Oslo. This is not bad, but there's rather a lot of the backstory, and I was not very fascinated by it. By the end it's clear that all that backstory WAS really necessary. I couldn't get myself to care a lot about those soldiers, though.

I did care a lot about Ellen, Harry's partner in the police force. I liked their relationship and their conversations. I like the way Harry respects and admires her. Similarly, I liked the way Harry is smitten by another female character, Rakel, newly introduced, whose father was one of those WWII soldiers (that's how she comes into the story). There's a sizable subplot about a creepy foreign service honcho who has the hots for Rakel, and in the end I thought THAT whole thing could have been eliminated. It was a total red herring.

Perhaps most disappointing was the ending, which has been _SO_ elaborately set up but reads like the final 30 minutes of 1,000 action movies -- oh my God! Someone's going to be assassinated! Harry has just figured it all out at the last possible second! He has to drive like a maniac to reach the scene in time! Will he make it? WILL HE MAKE IT?

Except -- just like in most of those predictable action-movie finales -- I was bored stiff by this labored sequence coming at the end of an overly convoluted 500-page detective story.

So one more chance, Jo Nesbo. I like Harry, and I like your writing well enough, but another one like this and I'm quitting.

Enjoying Nesbø quite a lot. If you like crime fiction or detective novels, I highly recommend these. Harry Hole is a wonderfully flawed, but highly capable cop in this series centered on Oslo.

Scandi-crime thriller, not my favorite genre

Listened to Audible audiobook version.
I enjoyed the story but not as much as "The Bat". The story bounces back and forth in time from WWII to today (which definitely requires some focus on the reader's part) and there are a good number of characters to keep straight. Enjoyed it but can't highly recommend it.

I tried. I think that this author/series/genre just isn’t for me. I like my fiction to be escapist, this is true. I like characters that seem real (flawed, but not in a cliché, ticky-box way) but end up with a happy ending. Harry Hole seems to be the opposite of this, in that he is an almost complete catostrophic mess stumbling from one disaster to the next, all character flaws on display, but somehow succeeding in the end, which just leaves a bad taste in my mouth because he shouldn’t still be employed. I’ve read that this genre is referred to as literary realism, but I can’t agree - not that flawed people like this don’t exist, but that he is still employed in the field that he is rather than shuffled into a back office where he can’t shoot allies or have televised drunken breakdowns.

continuing to outdo himself...

It was kind of a slog to get through this one. It only resembled Stieg Larsson in that there were lots of old Norwegian/Swedish men who were hard to differentiate. Neo-Nazis, old school Norwegian Nazis, love, police politics, and assassination. I have the sequel and may give it a try, but this did not satisfy my craving for some hard-boiled detective fiction. The translation is also a bit clumsy in parts.

Good police procedural set in Oslo - the usual minor problems of mixing up names that aren't familiar, but some good characters and story line (in fact several story lines woven together).

Easy to read, interesting premise, and lots of Norway. Enjoy this series of Detective stories.