Cold comfort in Scandi thriller without the thrills
Madness, murder and death in the modern welfare state
Crime Fiction; Victim Without a Face; By Stefan Ahnhem, translated by Rachel Willson-Broyles; Head of Zeus, €19.95
People love a good Scandinavian thriller. There are, it seems, two reasons for this. The first is atmosphere: all those snowcapped rococo spires and gloomy Copenhagen back alleys that make The Killing so beautiful to look at, or those endless fields of rapeseed through which Kurt Wallander stalks.
The other reason is murkier, and it has ...
