Post Mortem
Original title: Post Mortem
Author: David Lagercrantz
Original publisher: Norstedts Förlag
Genre: Crime Fiction
Post Mortem – One is Consumed with Guilt, Another Consumed with Shame
The hunt for a serial killer that leads straight into Stockholm's literary circles.
David Lagercrantz has yet again achieved an intricate and exciting story. He draws accurate and entertaining portraits of the protagonists from the literary universe that he knows so well: authors, literary agents, film producers... The story about the hunt for a serial killer in Stockholm’s literary world is partly based on a first-hand account of when Lagercrantz as a young man travelled through Europe with a friend who showed unexpected sides of his personality during their journey.
It is the end of the 1980s and Dag, who has inherited some money, buys a red BMW Cabriolet and sets off with his friend Pompe on a road trip through Europe. They party and discuss Celine, Hemingway and Leonard Cohen at the same speed that they travel from town to town through France and down to the Basque Country in northern Spain. However, Pompe's drinking habits gradually reveal a violent and dark side and Dag becomes increasingly worried that everything is about to get out of hand.
In Santander, Spain, Pompe and Dag get to know the young waitress Sandra who is smitten by the two young intellectual Scandinavians. They represent a lifestyle she longs for: the dream of becoming a writer. She hopes that the short story she is working on, inspired by a childhood encounter with an aggressive wild dog that left her with ugly scars on her legs, will open the doors to the literary Parnassus. Sandra is particularly drawn to Pompe. Before Dag decides to go back home, he feels he should make Sandra aware of Pompe’s true nature and what he is capable of...
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It is November 2008 in Stockholm as we meet Hans Rekke, who is going through a hypomanic episode, and Micaela Vargas, who has a new boyfriend she hasn't yet told Rekke about.
Rekke receives a surprise visit from the Spanish chief inspector Rafael Corales, who is unable to forget about the unsolved and brutal murder of a young woman in Santander in 1988. He firmly believes this case is connected to other cases of murdered women that he has recently found out about. He cannot disregard the thought that he has found a serial killer who leaves signs on the bodies of his victims, signs that seem to be a numerical order. Could Rekke help him to decipher these signs?
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The book switches between the two timelines – we follow Sandra during the last day of her life in Santander and Rekke and Vargas' search for clues in Stockholm's literary coterie. Soon a story unfolds about a serial killer who, aided by his sadistic and manipulative powers, has succeeded in making his closest friend believe that he is an accomplice. The men are connected by a dark secret, by shame and guilt, and in the repressed memories, the friend even believes that he is the one who carried out the brutal murder.
Pontus Bremer, a successful and boastful writer, manages to find some important clues with the help of Sandra's posthumously published short story. And when Rekke, under the pretence of publishing his solved cases, turns to literary agent Oliver Popov, who is partly admired and loathed, he believes he may have solved the mystery of who the killer is. But is it maybe a delusion? Is it one or two perpetrators? And if so, where can they be found today?
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Rights to Rekke/Vargas 1-3 has been sold to over 30 countries. Read more here.
