3.5 stars

This is another Scandinavian author whose catalogue is gradually being translated for the North American audience. It features CI Van Veeteren, a Swedish cop with more than 30 years on the job.
Van Veeteren is currently enjoying the last days of his summer vacation when his chief calls. Seems they're having a little problem with an axe murderer in nearby Kaalbringen. Would he mind popping over & having a look around?
There he meets Bausen, the soon-to-retire chief & his crew, one of whom is a young, ambitious detective named Beate Moerk. Unfortunately they're spinning their wheels. After exhaustive investigation, there seems to be no rhyme or reason behind the murders. And while they shift through endless reports & interviews, another victim falls to the axe.
If you're into fast paced thrillers with lots of car chases & things that go boom, this is not for you. Yes, it's a police procedural but it's also a character study of its' star, Van Veeteren. He's a man of a certain age who has closed every case in his career, save one. His personal life has not been as successful. He's divorced & alone with a son currently out on parole.
He's not a flashy or aggressive character. Instead, he's the soft spoken guy on the periphery who sees & hears everything. Long walks & playing chess allow him to let all the information percolate in his head until the connections start to appear. It can be frustrating for those around him as he doesn't appear to be doing anything. Beate reacts by striking out on her own, desperate for action & to make a name for herself. It could cost her life.
This is a slow, introspective read that is more about the characters than the case. Even the killer gets a chance to tell his gut wrenching story about his quest for revenge. The pace pick up in the final few pages as his identity is revealed but the resolution brings the team more sadness than satisfaction.
As for the eponymous Borkmann, well...he shows up more in spirit than in person. For fans of Barbara Fradkin, David Whellams or Quentin Bate's "Gunnhildur" series.

BORKMANN'S POINT is the second book in the Inspector Van Veeteren series, but the only one currently available in English. Nesser lives in Sweden and has set his book in a fictitious small Scandinavian town.

An ex-con is murdered by a blow from a very unusual, extremely sharp instrument. Soon a real-estate mogul is killed in the same way seemingly with the same weapon. Van Veeteren, who was holidaying on the coast nearby, is stopped from returning home and sent to help the local under-experienced police team. Van Veeteren finds an immediate friendship Bausen, the head of the local police, due to retire any day now. Bausen is very anxious to get this serial killer, dubbed unsurprisingly, The Axeman caught and stopped so that he doesn't have to retire with this case outstanding.

The local team is made up of two investigators: Beate Moerk who is trying very hard, but she's very inexperienced and Kropke who is very full of himself, but very obsessed with technology and extremely naive. There are also two Constables - Bangs and Mooser - again a bit bumbling and out of their depth. Van Veeteren brings Munster, one of his own team down to the small town to assist, and the whole group tries desperately to find some sort of link between the victims to try to explain why. When a third victim is found, this time with the weapon itself, there's still no obvious links and the weapon, no matter how unusual is old and doesn't help much either.

Slowly an idea of a connection between the victims starts to reveal itself to Van Veeteren, as the murderer's thinking is slowly revealed to the reader.

There's nothing much in the solution that the reader can't see coming in this book. BORKMANN'S POINT is actually a reference to a theory on solving crimes that a senior officer tells Van Veeteren years before and in this case, it's actually quite true. There is a point in the book, quite a bit before the finish where it's possible to see the solution quite clearly.

There's a good sense of humour at play throughout the book which certainly helps and Van Veeteren is one of those rumpled detective types that does appeal to me in particular, but there was something about the arch tone of some of the conversation which just didn't quite sit right. Add to that the fact that it wasn't the most original or involving mystery, it wasn't the WOW read that other recent books have been.

Having said that, it was definitely readable, with a good sense of place, a nice sense of humour and a cast of characters with some potential.

-did there come a point, he had started to wonder, beyond which we no longer look forward to something coming, but only to getting away from what has passed?

Borkmann’s Point, second in the DCI Van Veeteren series by veteran Swedish author, Håkan Nesser is quintessential Nordic Noir. Brooding, slightly depressive characters, atmospheric, melancholy and procedural - all the elements of the genre, set in a fictitious Northern European country resembling something of Germany or the Netherlands perhaps.

Van Veeteren is a bit of a cantankerous cop, renown for his out of the box capacity to solve crimes and Borkmann’s Point is no exception. A serial killer is on the loose and there seems to be no motive, no link between victims and no clues to go by.

I found this one to be quite interesting in that we hear the voice of a number of characters throughout the book. Van Veeteren does in some ways seem to be a character on par with some of the others... Münster, for example. I quite liked that, however, the novel did seem to lose its centre albeit slightly, by the multi focus.

All in all an excellent second novel in the series, not quite as impactful as the first but nevertheless, Nesser is a must read author for me. 4 stars.

Swedish author in translation. Promising series with a very interesting plot. This started out slow but got much better as it got going. There's not a lot of character development--I'm not even sure what the characters look like or their ages--which is a negative for me. But it was an enjoyable read and I found the mystery very intriguing. Will read more Inspector Van Veeteren.

одного тому нессера замало для відновлення балансу скандинавських детективів в організмі, але початок покладено. звісно, інспектор ван вейтерен – це не зовсім те, що потрібно, коли душа просить харрі холе (ох, тепер я справді починаю розуміти, під яким тиском публіки конан дойл воскресив шерлока холмса), але він теж доволі симпатичний персонаж зі складним життям і психосоматичною залежністю від роботи. will have to suffice.

I prefer Nesser to Jo Nesbo-but still like Henning Mankell the best so far of the Scandinavian mystery writers.

Είναι από τα πρώτα βιβλία του Νέσσερ που διάβασα. Μου άρεσε, είχε αργή πλοκή σε κάποια σημεία που πιστεύω ότι ήταν απαραίτητα για την εξέλιξη της πλοκής. Η σκιαγράφηση των προσώπων έγινε με μέτρο δίνοντας τα απαραίτητα στοιχεία στον αναγνώστη για να σχηματίσει μια εικόνα των ηρώων χωρίς να φτάσει στην λύση από τα πρώτα κεφάλαια. Η περιγραφή των τοπίων και των μερών ήταν λιτή, ωστόσο ένιωθες τον σκοτάδι και την μυρωδιά της θάλασσας, την μυρωδιά του χώματος κατά έναν περίεργο τρόπο. Ο λόγος που δεν έβαλα 5 αστέρια είναι γιατί δεν παρασύρθηκα, το διάβαζα συγκρατημένα.

Continuing my exploration of Scandinavian crime fiction.... This might be the most classicist of the ones I read, since the title character, with his love esp of chess and conversation and classical music really reminds me of Maigret.

The story itself is pretty good, except for being upended by a kind of silly twist as to "whodunit"-- there's an ax murderer attacking seemingly unrelated people, and Van Veteeren and his aide-de-camp Munster, along with Beate Moerke, the plucky female detective of the resort town of Kaalingen where the murder's occur, will solve it.

The Borkman's Point of the title refers to advice from Van Veteeren's mentor, and describes the point at which you have all the info you need and when everything new is a distraction. I actually kind of like the concept, though I wonder how it's deployed here-- in other words, I'm not sure the resolution of the plot really endorses Borkman's theory.

In sum, the book is decent but not great-- I can see how some people might see Van Veteeren as a little vanilla, and with a couple more books that resolve as this one does, a little in the Murder, She Wrote, Father Dowling camp. But this one book, by itself, is pretty appealing.

Title significance :
The title of the work refers to a tipping point in the solving of crimes as proposed by an admired senior colleague of Van Veeteren during his time as a probationer in the force. Chief Inspector Borkmann alone considered the time aspect of investigation and maintained that there came a point where no more information was needed. On reaching that point the superior detective knows enough to solve the case which depends on "some decent thinking".[1] Borkmann's point also marked the difference between a good investigator and a bad one. The good detective tries to establish when that point is reached, or passed; a bad one, lacking this ability, carries on unnecessarily

23. A book set in Scandinavia (Sweden)
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