Faceless Killers

A Kurt Wallander Mystery

By: Henning Mankell, Steven T. Murray - translator

Narrated by: Dick Hill

Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins

Publisher's summary

First in the Kurt Wallander mystery series.

It was a crime of senseless violence. On a cold night in a remote Swedish farmhouse, an elderly farmer was bludgeoned to death, his wife left to die with a noose around her neck. As if this didn't present enough problems for Ystad police inspector Kurt Wallander, the dying woman's last word, his only tangible clue, were foreign. If publicized, they could be the match that would inflame Sweden's already smoldering anti-immigrant sentiments.

With this case - unlike the situation with his ex-wife, his estranged daughter, or the young prosecutor who has piqued his interest - Wallander feels he has a problem he can handle. He quickly becomes obsessed with solving the crime before the already tense situation explodes, though it will require all of his talent to do so.

©1991 Henning Mankell, English translation 1997 Steven T. Murray (P)2006 Blackstone Audio Inc.

Critic reviews

"An exquisite novel of mesmerizing depth and suspense." (Los Angeles Times)
"Mankell's work mixes compelling procedural details with strong social consciousness....A superior novel and a harbinger of great things to come." (Booklist)
"[A] brilliant U.S. debut....The author goes well beyond the narrow police procedural in creating a full-bodied Wallender and in casting light on the refugee problem in contemporary Swedish society." (Library Journal)

Listen on a higher speed!

That’s the only way to endure the narrator. Listened to at normal speed, every character sounds tipsy, slow-witted, and a bit Yiddish. The story was ok, but the reading was just terrible.

Typical Mankell and Wallander

Maybe not the best Wallander story but good all the same. I think this is Mankell's first Wallander book and the character and his background appears fully created here.
It took time to get used to the narrator.

Can't stop listening

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

Yes. The main character is so human.

What did you like best about this story?

The mystery and the characters.

Which character – as performed by Dick Hill – was your favorite?

Wallender

Any additional comments?

I like the country of Sweden descriptions.

Ok, but a bit of a downer

I kind of like the main character here, he's been knocked down and trying to pull his life together, but do all the characters have to be so depressing? His ex-wife is plain nasty (of course), his daughter was homeless and has mental heath issues, his father is mean and slipping towards alzheimers... It felt like each new character was struggling with a burdensome life... Somewhere people are happy, right? not here.

Not one of my top picks

Is there anything you would change about this book?

I would change the narrator. I like this narrator doing Michael Connelly books - Harry Bosch. But, I did not like the reading of this book. Perhaps because the reader sounded too much like an LA cop doing a Norwegian mystery. It just didn't work, and I was eager to go on to something else.

What didn’t you like about Dick Hill’s performance?

Too much like an American. It just didn't work.

Do you think Faceless Killers needs a follow-up book? Why or why not?

I would probably not read it. I thought it was too predictable, and not very stimulating.

Any additional comments?

I don't feel it came up to the hype of the "Norwegian Stieg"

Doesn’t get any better…..

Mankell’s impeccable story-telling at its best! Wallander’s less than perfect characteristics makes him that much more human and admirable.
Dick Hill’s performance in capturing the essence of Wallander is impeccable.

Enjoyed my first Henning Mankell mystery

This series was recommended by my stepmother, a big mystery fan who never steers me wrong. I found the mystery intelligent and well told, the story brought up many contemporary topics in a way a more serious novel would do. That aspect of the book is certainly one of the best things about it. THe narrator was good, not great, but his accents were convincing and his reading pace very nice. The characters were believable and the things that take place seem likely and convincing, while the author allows us to see what he thinks about many contemporary problems in Swedish society while constructing a good mystery. Intelligent and thoughtful, I enjoyed it and will definitely listen to more of this author's work.

Faulty narration mars the story

Since stumbling on the extraordinary trilogy by Steig Larsson, I???ve learned that Swedish writers have a long-standing reputation for producing great crime writing and have followed the hordes in tracking down some of these writers. First, of course, came Per Wahloo and Maj Sjowall, a fabulous writing team from the 1960s and 70s. Now, the hugely popular Henning Mankell and his famous police detective of the 90s, Kurt Wallander.

Given his enormous popularity I was really looking forward to these books, but I was very disappointed by "Faceless Killers", the first in the series. Many reviewers find it riveting and entertaining, but I found that it dragged. The pace of the action is set over several months and there are many days when Wallander turns up in the office and the sum of the work is ???nothing happened today.??? Later in the book, the reader is taken more smoothly over these stages when there is little development in the case, but Mankell could have handled this more deftly early on. As it is, it causes severe problems with the pacing.

While Wallander???s character is broadly developed, full of faults and personal crises, it almost feels forced, as if the problematic character is stuck in to fill the gaps while we wait for something to happen in the action of the mystery. The rest of the police investigation team is not well developed and I had trouble keeping most of them straight.

Some (or perhaps all) of this may be down to the narration. Dick Hill was an inappropriate choice of narrator for this series. Hill approaches the material as if he???s reading Beat poetry rather than a police procedural. All his characterizations sound as if they???re 70-year-old Jewish men whining about parking, rather than young and middle-aged professional cops. The translation from the Swedish is to British English, but Hill reads with a Brooklyn accent incompatible with the language. Hearing distinctly British word choices (strand instead of beach, ???a video??? vs. VCR, first floor vs. second) read straight outta Brooklyn or the mispronunciation of words (pension as ???pen-shun???) is jarring. Speeding up the playback helped with the slowly. Punctuated. Beat. Interpretation. and the worst dragging of the narrative development, but I won???t try another of Mankell???s books read by Hill.

A Little Whine With Your Mystery

I liked the way the author introduced our main mystery and interwove other cases making quite a basketweave out of the book, but I did get tired of the constant whinning of our main protagonist. My wife left me, I drink too much, my daughter avoids me, my father is nuts, and on we go. I like reality when I read (or listen), but all dark and no laughter gets boring after a while.

Dick Hill did a credible job with his narration. He did a good job of finding the voice of Kurt Wallander, and I enjoyed the resonance his voice gave to the characters.

Narrator problems

I cannot decide if Wallander is a whiny, annoying, inept character, or if he was just read that way by the narrator. I do know that I was very disappointed by this story.

This is my favorite genre, and have yet to meet a flawed male detective from the east side of the Atlantic that I didn't like, until now. But I suspect it was largely due to the narrator, which is a shame.

The story itself wasn't bad, although the lapse of several months was a bit odd toward the end.

Willing to give the author another chance, but not the narrator.