Hey Sweden. What's up?

Do you need to talk?

Actually, it's not just you, Sweden. All your buddies in Northern Europe, Land of the Midnight Sun, Land of a Thousand Lakes, Mother Svea, whatever you want to call it, have some dark psychological issues. At least if you go by the books coming out of your region. I mean, seriously guys, you need more sunlight or less salted herring or more hockey or something? Because your authors are producing some twisted shit.


And it's awesome.

Teenage girl killers, child vampires, zombies, murders that look like suicides, serial killers making snowmen out of people (among other things in that particular series,) folks being forced to "donate" their organs in a dystopian society not so far away, and of course, that whole Girl with the Dragon Tattoo thing.

I'll start with Jo Nesbo (Norway) because he's the cutest and his mom was a librarian. I accidentally got into Scandinavian authors by picking up his Snowman, which is number 7 in the Harry Hole series. For whatever reason, the books are being released in the U.S. in the weirdest, half-assed fashion I've ever seen. I'm seriously not even sure they're being released in the right order. Not cool. But whatever, you can read each book as an individual story. You'll miss a little back story, but it'll still make sense.The whole series revolves around Detective Harry Hole, a binge-drinking, Doc Marten-wearing, anti-hero who also happens to be the best crime solver on the Oslo Police Force. His personal life is always a mess, he's always in trouble with his superiors, yet the worst of the worst cases come to him. All the books in the series have twisty, turn-y plot lines and moody atmospheres. Nesbo is definitely not selling Norway. The newest in the series, Phantom, looks good too- just not enough hours in the day.

My favorite book of 2012 is from heir apparent to Stephen King, John Ajvide Lindqvist. Lindqvist, best know in the US as the author of Let the Right One In (made into two great movies, Swedish & English) is redefining the horror genre. Yet the book I love best is his first "non-supernatural" novel. Don't get me wrong, I got a hell of a sunburn because I was so engrossed in Handling the Undead that I failed to notice I was on fire. And Harbor has ruined little kids for me (not that I was really a huge fan.) Even Little Star, released in English in October, has elements of the supernatural, but ultimately it's about alienation, bullying, fame and teenage angst. Because nothing says Happy Holidays like a gang of murderous teen girls.

Left for dead in the woods, Theres is rescued (if you can call it that) by D-list musician and wife beater Lennart Cederström. Upon discovered her perfect pitch Cederström makes the (odd) decision to hide her in his basement and create the perfect singing machine. By the time Theres is a teenager, she is eerily beautiful, with a spooky stare and no concept of or right or wrong. When events take a gruesome turn (with a drill) she ends up in Stockholm with her "brother" Jerry, one of the many adults in her life that treat her like a commodity they can use for their own end. After appearing on the Swedish American Idol, Theres hooks up with the bullied, overweight Theresa and together they make a chilling duo. They create a gang of alienated, disenfranchised teenage girls who are fiercely devoted only to one another, to the point of torture and murder. Twisted and grisly, Little Star is a compelling and horrifying tale about the suffering of modern living with an equally compelling and horrifying cast of characters.

Oh, and you'll never listen to ABBA the same again.

Unless you live in a vacuum or under a rock, you cannot have missed the explosion of Stieg Larsson's Millennium Trilogy. I read all three (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The Girl Who Played with Fire, and The GirlWho Kicked the Hornet's Nest) under duress. I refused to read it because everyone else had. I'm contrary like that. (Of course as soon as I started I read all three in three days; I'm not too proud to admit I was wrong.) Be forewarned, there is a lot of violence. And much of it is against women. There were moments where I had to put down The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and take a breath. Lisbeth Salander is  possibly my favorite fictional character of all time. And I wouldn't kick Michael Bloomkvist out of bed either (especially the Daniel Craig version.) The Swedish movies are fantastic and the US version of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is prettier, it is true to the book.

Ninni Holmqvist, The Unit

I went through a phase at the beginning of the year where all I wanted to read was dystopian fiction (after that phase I was super-interested the French Revolution, so...) Think Handmaid's Tale/Hunger Games kind of stuff. Because I'm a cheerful sort. The Unit stayed with me for a long time. Basically, if you're a single woman, without children or a job in a "progressive" industry at the age of 50 (the age for men is 60 because they are considered useful for a longer time) you check into a lovely place called the Reserve Bank Unit. You are given a clean, nicely furnished apartment, you are well-fed with lots of recreational opportunities. Oh, and you are a guinea pig for medical research and also have to donate your organs, one at a time, until the "final donation." Cool.

Camilla Läckberg, The Ice Princess & The Preacher
Picked these up at the library this week. Some of the reviews said The Preacher was the best Swedish crime novel of 2005 and in fact, Läckberg was voted Swedish Writer of the Year that year. Considered the Agatha Christie of Sweden, Läckberg was an economist until one creative writing class changed the course of her life. I'm about 50 pages into The Ice Princess and while it's compelling and well-written, Agatha Christie never wrote about bloody, frozen bodies in bathtubs!


And let's give a shout-out to all those translators. Without them, these books would be unreadable to me.