A sharp-edge thriller, launching the Harry Hole series in a new direction.
Harry Hole, the infamous Oslo detective, has been through a lot over 25 years on the police force. He is considered a renegade and a rebel by colleagues and the media, with very different overarching opinions of same. At the end of his last case covered off in Nesbo’s previous novel, The Thirst, Harry crossed a very dangerous line and the results have not been kind to him.
The love of his life, Rakel, has left him and moved on with her life – this time, permanently – and a case from his early years as a police officer has returned to haunt him. Svein Finne, a homicidal rapist, labelled ‘The Fiancé’, has been released from prison and it appears he has returned to his old ways, in spite of time away.
As Harry sinks into the depths of alcoholic despair at the loss of Rakel, his misery is deepened by her horrific murder. Hole suspects it was Finne who committed the crime as an act of revenge. In spite of warnings, Hole is determined to follow through on proving his theory.
Knifeis a major departure in style from the previous Harry Hole novels, with a greater focus on the story and the characters’ actions and reactions, without the extremely graphic violence that we have come to know. This however, is not a bad thing as this is, regardless of crimes and motivations, his most emotionally driven work to date.
It is no light undertaking from the novels content to its sheer weight and size, and it deserves to be savoured as we await the next work. With all that comes from this novel, the direction of both the future works and the future of Harry Hole is going in a different direction.
Reviewed by Glen Christie
Distributed by: Penguin Books Australia
Released: July 2019
RRP: $32.95
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