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A review by melbsreads
Block 46 by Maxim Jakubowski, Johana Gustawsson
dark
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
Trigger warnings: Holocaust, murder, death, gore, graphic descriptions of murder, enucleation, death of a child, body horror, fire, animal death
I bought this over a year ago and then was never quite in the mood to read it. I thought for sure I was going to love this because Scandinavian crime tends to really work for me. What I didn't realise, however, is that this is actually FRENCH crime that happens to be set in Scandinavia. And French literature generally is NOT for me.
That proved very much to be the case here. I felt like I was wading through quicksand reading this. There was more character depth and detail about the killer than there was about the investigator protagonists. At least one of them (possibly two? Who's to say) is a profiler, but she never seems to actually do any profiling. Or much police work at all, to be quite honest.
The writing was strangely emotionally detached and I struggled to pick this up because I just wasn't really enjoying much about it. The reveal about the killer's identity was somewhat more interesting, but still not enough to save this from being aggressively mediocre for me.
I bought this over a year ago and then was never quite in the mood to read it. I thought for sure I was going to love this because Scandinavian crime tends to really work for me. What I didn't realise, however, is that this is actually FRENCH crime that happens to be set in Scandinavia. And French literature generally is NOT for me.
That proved very much to be the case here. I felt like I was wading through quicksand reading this. There was more character depth and detail about the killer than there was about the investigator protagonists. At least one of them (possibly two? Who's to say) is a profiler, but she never seems to actually do any profiling. Or much police work at all, to be quite honest.
The writing was strangely emotionally detached and I struggled to pick this up because I just wasn't really enjoying much about it. The reveal about the killer's identity was somewhat more interesting, but still not enough to save this from being aggressively mediocre for me.