Echoes from the Dead by Johan Theorin
I recently spotted an article on the Guardian website titled The Artists' Artist: Crime Writers Five crime writers nominate their favourite living author in their field. There are several very good looking tips including one from Ann Cleeves recommending a Swedish author’s first book, Echoes from the Dead by Johan Theorin. I immediately checked the catalogue of my local Rockport Public Library and there it was on the shelves and available for borrowing. I scurried over to the library forthwith, borrowed the book and was just about glued to it from beginning to end.
It is a slightly unusual mystery/crime novel in that a conventional style “detective” is not part of the story. The plot unfolds in the present - in this case the mid 1990s - and in many “glimpses” into the past. The scale of this novel is exactly human and is so familiar to the reader because of its understated ordinariness. The island is a co-character in the plot and provides both continuity and a wonderful almost dream-like atmosphere that one associates with childhood memories of glorious summers by the sea.
I hate to talk about the plot because I wouldn’t want this little review to be a spoiler for the real thing. But what I can say is that Johan Theorin manages to create for the reader a very gentle but relentless momentum to his unfolding story. I found so much more than just a “who-dunnit” in this unique book. I discovered (yet again) the magic of the memories of childhood; the slow healing of terrible loss and pain; the frustrations of the frailty of aging and the the power of love and reconciliation.
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