Misterioso: Intercrime, Book 1

I totally enjoyed this book and hope they hurry up with the rest of the series, I'll be getting them all. It is very well written, kept my interest and you start to get a real feel for the cast of characters. The narration is terrific. I've never heard John Lee before but I'll be looking out for him in future. If you like Scandinavian crime fiction, this won't disappoint.

This one squeaked through the cracks of attempts to find the next Steig Larsson. It's written (or translated) in a fairly disjointed style. It's plot and climax are overburdened with coincidence. The author seems to acknowledge this by throwing in lines like "it seemed an unbelievable chain of coincidences." That really doesn't make up for the poorly constructed plot. I'd give this one a pass.

A suspenseful and well written mystery. The investigation's progress seemed realistic and was believable. The narrator was excellent. Very enjoyable listening experience.

This is a great story: a special group of experienced cops come together to solve a series of high profile murders in Sweden. Many characters, hard to follow, especially because of the proliferation of Swedish names. This is written for Swedes, who have no problem with numerous place names. John Lee does, as usual, a great job of narrating, although he can be a bit pompous.

I was excited when I started listening to this book but it just seemed to fall apart after the first few chapters. I got very bored listening and had a tough time finishing. I am not sure why it affected me this way... I wasn't impressed.

This thing is just plain ugly. I know that human beings are often hypocritical, maybe even more often than not, but I really, really hope that the Swedish police are not the unethical thugs that some of them are portrayed in Misterioso. I hope that they are, instead, much closer to the portrayal by Henning Mankel in the Kurt Wallander series. There are several bloopers that indicate sloppy editing, but that's not the reason I'll never purchase another book by Arne Dahl, who is oddly preachy on a variety of controversial political issues, given the illegal and cruel activities that some of his police get up to, after which they are rehabilitated and welcomed back to their group of fellow officers as if their transgressions were all in the spirit of the "ends justifies the means" excuse, which I personally find repulsive, especially in "police procedurals."

The narrator isnt bad and does make the ordeal of listening to Misterioso (a romantic name for a dirty back alley experience) barely bearable. Still, the verbal constructs recorded for our listening displeasure are, as I said before, just plain ugly. I hesitate advising anyone to avoid this one like the plague and warning against wasting your credits. I can only say that I wish I had never wasted a credit on such an unpleasant experience and personally plan to avoid this author like the plague in the future. His world view is offensive and the opposite of entertaining. I truly appreciate Henning Mankel just that much more now and will read more of his episodes about the basic, underlying Swedish integrity that guides his main character, Wallander, instead.