Autumn Killing out in the US
23 September 14
Today is the release of Autumn Killing in the US. Here is a review I like very much:
'This is not an airport novel. It's hard work. It is brilliantly written and shows deep understanding of human nature, whether in personal relationships, the frequently unrewarding slog of police work or the workings of a mind under stress. Kallentoft has a unique style, cleverly blending flashbacks with current action, deep analysis with the mundane, and his introduction of what can only be called a supernatural figure as part-narrator, which owes more than a little to the Shakespeare's Ghost of Hamlet's Father, and adds an unusual and thought-provoking psychic twist.
As dark as the autumn nights in rural Sweden, as cold as the winter they presage, this is one for the connoisseurs of crime writing. It will leave you shaken at its mental brutality and possibly more than a little confused, but although it's sometimes hard going just to keep in touch, it's well worth the effort.'
John Cleal, Reviewing the evidence
Since a couple of days The fifth season is out in paperback in UK, Canada and Australia. Here are a handful of quotes from some of the reviews:
'The Fifth Season is atmospheric, disturbing and memorable.'
The Sydney Morning Herald
'Tense, dark and suspenseful . . . leads us into the darkest corners of the human psyche'
Daily Express
'Meditative, dark and really, really cold'
Booklist (starred review)
'Beautiful, exquisite, original'
Literary Review
'A well-crafted murder story that once more shows the violence done to women.'
Crimepieces
'The Fifth Season signals the end of Mons Kallentoft’s highly individual ’season’ series with his intutive detective Malin Fors. Kallentoft himself called the novels in the sequence a Dante-esque study in evil, looking at it from all possible angles to try to discern what evil actually is, where it comes from, what it feels like, how it smells….
This confrontation with the inner core of human malfeasance means that The Fifth Season is, inevitably, a gruesome and shocking book, But Kallentoft is never gratutitous: every disturbing thing in these pages serves a distict purpose. Kallentoft has a dispassionate eye regarding his characters, but that doesn’t stop the reader becoming totally involved. What’s more, Kallentoft, with his highly unusual style, produces something quite unlike other writers on the Scandinavain crime scene.'
Barry Forshaw
Read more about the books and the reviews here: