Detective Louise Rick takes on one of the more challenging
and personal cases in her career when a man starts tracking
and meeting women on the Internet that he ultimately rapes.
Located in Copenhagen, Denmark, Louise is adjusting to
living with her boyfriend, Peter, and trying to balance her
career with her relationship. Currently, that's not working
out all that great, but with this Internet dating rapist
running around loose, Louise can't focus on her problems at
home. Besides, Peter is being so wonderful and understanding
about all of her long hours at work.
The first victim, Susanne, is thoroughly brutalized and
terrorized through her experience. Susanne also has another
huge issue that comes in the form of her controlling mother.
However, Louise is finally able to get Susanne the help she
needs to open up about her attack as well as her attacker.
She no sooner starts to get promising information from
Susanne, when another rape occurs. This time, though, the
victim dies and the game has suddenly changed.
The more that Louise looks into the online dating craze,
she's amazed that there aren't more attacks such as these.
She starts to track down clues to this man's identity and
realizes that he's been doing this for a while and that
there are multiple victims. As she continues to dig deeper
into these online dating sites, her best friend, reporter
Camilla Lind, meets a man from a dating sites. She's
thrilled but Louise is very nervous and concerned for her
friend. Camilla brushes off Louise's concerns and continues
to see this man.
In the meantime, Peter and Louise are spending less and less
time together due to all the time she must spend trying to
find this guy before he attacks another woman. They've been
in love for six years, though, so they'll make it, won't
they? At least that's what Louise tells herself.
As Louise closes in on the identity of the rapist, she feels
the pressure of needing to catch him quickly because the
more she learns about him the more she understands just how
dangerous he really is. She's also afraid that his true
identity may just strike a bit too close to home.
CALL ME PRINCESS is one of several Louise Rick novels by
Danish writer Sara Blaedel. It's exciting and entertaining
to read novels set in exotic locations and Ms. Blaedel does
an excellent job of painting a detailed picture of her city.
She also knows how to combine just the right amount of
suspense and personality into her novels. I was riveted to
this book from the very first page and had no clue how it
would all end until the last chapter. Do yourself a favor
and curl up with CALL ME PRINCESS. It makes great reading
for a rainy afternoon.
A young woman in Copenhagen, Susanne Hansson, becomes the
victim of an unusually brutal rape attack in her own home.
detective inspector Louise Rick is summoned to talk to the
victim, where she quickly determines that Susanne met the
rapist via a dating website, a fact that Susanne shamefully
tries to hide, especially from her domineering mother.
The police suspect that the rapist may have been
caught on video in the subway, so Louise and a colleague go
through the tapes. They’re lucky enough to find him, but
unfortunately the image is blurry and shows him only in
profile. While the police investigation is making progress,
things take a negative turn for Susanne, who tries to
commit suicide. The rape is not the only reason.
In
the meantime Louise becomes more and more immersed in the
online dating world. In her search she comes across the web
site “nightwatch.dk,” which allows her to upload images that
show people out in the night-time scene and who they’re
with. She finds a picture of the man, who is now calling
himself “Prinzz.” She contacts him using the name
"Princess," and they agree to meet.
With a climax as
suspenseful as it is shocking, Sara Blaedel's American debut
confirms her as one of the brightest stars in the new wave
of Scandinavian crime novelists that has riveted the
attention of readers around the world.
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