The Preacher is a mystery. The body of a young woman is found. Naked and broken, she is found on a blanket. Beneath the blanket are bones, not of one person but two. Patrik Hedstrom has his hands full with the new murder, the old murders, and the imminent birth of his first child.
Bottom line: The Preacher is for you if you like complex whodunnits led by engaging characters set in the beauty of Sweden.
Strengths of the story. With this second book, the story settles with Patrik Hedstrom was the lead. The mystery is a police procedural that brings in everyone at the Tanumshede police station. While Patrik does lead, the other police officers have meaningful assignments, which gives the mystery a rich texture. This is not a story where one man does all the work.
Surrounding the mystery is the drama of Patrik’s home life. He is living with his girlfriend, Erica, in her family home. She is eight months pregnant during a heat wave. And there is the never ending stream of free loading family looking for a few days on the water.
I personally enjoyed the balance between the mystery and the homelife. This mystery is pretty heavy. The homelife gives a nice counterpoint that is a mix of humorous, sweet, and ridiculous.
As with ICE PRINCESS (Book #1), this mystery is very complicated. There is no way for readers to solve this one ahead of Patrik. This book is listed on Amazon as a serial killer thriller, a kidnap thriller, and a murder story. This isn’t especially strong as a thriller – Patrik is working in a police procedural manner. He is not in danger. The categories give away that there is a serial killer element as well as a kidnapping element, both of which give an urgency to the investigation that creates a mood more alike a thriller.
Where the story fell short of ideal: This story crosses lines of mystery and thriller. If a reader prefers one or the other, you may not be fully satisfied with this story. It is for crossover readers. While the reader does get a full explanation of what happened, the author hands it to us, the detective doesn’t earn it. On one hand, it’s satisfying. On the other, the structure of the story did not enable the mystery to be resolved.
As with the first book, I struggled with the author holding back information. This story is written in third-person omniscient from the point of view of the section’s narrator. Intellectually, I know it is supposed to build curiosity and intrigue when the character whose head I am in looks, for example, at a newspaper article but doesn’t say what’s in it. For me, this creates frustration. In talking to other readers, some have the same pet peeve, others don’t. This is definitely a subjective issue.
TG Wolff 