Danish Thomas Bagger is a top-notch crime writer, and the crime book “Mannen i tre deler” is exciting, grotesque and very well written.
The discovery of a body at Smøl Voll near Esbjerg in Southern Jutland will prove to be the start of a series of murders of young women.
This is the first book in what will become a crime trilogy by the Danes’ new crime favourite, Thomas Bagger.
And Bagger enters the crime scene with a book in which the progress is excellent, and the action at its best is relentlessly and relentlessly exciting.
The local police chief, William Grandberg, belongs to one of the district’s absolute richest and most influential families. He looks forward to leading the investigation into his first major murder case.
But when Grandberg himself can surprisingly be linked to the first body discovery, expertise from Copenhagen and the special force Task Force 14 must be brought in.
Thus we are introduced to a classic married couple:
The withdrawn and deeply traumatized David Flugt and his unpredictable superior Lucas Stage.
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Another important figure is the policewoman Jenny Seland, born and raised in Esbjerg. She is assigned to investigate another murder, as well as a missing persons case which at first appears to have no connection with the findings at Smøl Voll.
But do you believe that it is the whole and complete truth?
As the pile of more or less rotting corpses grows around them, Flugt and Stage become increasingly entangled in local intrigue, old disappearance cases and general gossip. And in the Grandberg family, everyone has secrets to hide and enemies to watch out for.
In line with the custom when it comes to modern crime fiction, we are also served solid doses of heavy psychiatry along the way.
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The narrator’s perspective constantly shifts between the most important people, and as if that wasn’t enough, we also have a detour to Timisoara in Romania. Things happen here that several times cross the line of what is realistically credible.
Bloody and grotesque scenes that touch on the speculative.
But the blood trail from Romania will also turn out to point towards Esbjerg and Sønderjylland.
“The man in three parts” is an impressively complex crime story, where constantly new clues come together convincingly in the end. With the right twist literally on the last page.
A sequel has already been announced later this year.
What impresses most about this book, however, is the language. Thomas Bagger writes simply very well.
So even if a little is to be deducted for the lack of originality in the type drawings, there is little doubt that this is one of the spring’s best crime books.
Reviewed by: Sindre Hovdenakk
