Throughout his career, Swedish journalist and storyteller David Lagercrantz has had a deep interest in – and brilliant touch for – enigmatic, eccentric characters, both fictional and real-life. In terms of global readers, he’s best known for continuing Stieg Larsson’s iconic ‘Millennium’ series starring goth hacker antihero Lisbeth Salander. But Lagercrantz has also penned books on persecuted maths genius Alan Turing and mercurial footballer Zlatan Ibrahimović, as well as launching his own
crime series.
In Fatal Gambit, he continues his own ‘Holmes and Watson’ style series, as the husband of a supposedly long-dead financier brings tough Stockholm cop Micaela Vargas a holiday snap he swears shows his wife still living. Vargas, a child of political refugees, loops in upper-class forensics genius Hans Rekke, but as they investigate Rekke is falling apart again, Vargas is in conflict with her gangster brother, and the unlikely duo uncover a conspiracy involving high-ranking Swedish officials, international bankers, and organised crime in eastern Europe. Then there’s an old enemy from Rekke’s past, re-emerging.
All the threads are masterfully woven together in a terrific tale that gives a few nods to his love of Conan Doyle, while being a modern crime thriller that builds to a thrilling finale. Two books in, it’s already a very good series. More please.
Reviewed by Craig Sisterson
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
After studying philosophy and religion, he obtained a degree from the Gothenburg School of Journalism. He did a four-year stint as crime reporter at Expressen, at the time the largest newspaper in Scandinavia, where he covered the most prominent murder cases in Sweden during the late 80s and early 90s.
He made his book debut in 1997 with the story of Göran Kropp, a Swedish adventurer who summited Mount Everest with neither oxygen nor Sherpas, barely one week after one of the worst disasters ever on the mountain. The book was a success in Sweden and abroad and paved the way for a non-fiction writing career.
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