A sensation in Sweden, MARKED FOR LIFE by Emelie Schepp, the first in a trilogy of thrillers about prosecutor Jana Berzelius, makes its American debut this summer. I'm not as familiar with Scandinavian thrillers as many, my only experience being the Ewert grens series by Roslund- Hellstrom, and this novel shared many of the idiosyncrasies I didn't care for but not the benefits. The synopsis sounds enticing and much of the story itself intrigues, but Schepp includes far too much extraneous detail of my taste.
A high-ranking member of the immigration board is found dead in his home. The most peculiar aspect of the murder scene are a child's fingerprints as the couple has none. Prosecutor Jana Berzelius, a successful but emotionally cold woman, leads the investigation. At first she works with the police, most of them odd and unlikeable, but when the body of a preteen boy is found on a deserted beach with the gun that killed the official, she changes her path.
The boy's body is riddled with track marks, but during the autopsy, they also discover letters carved in the back of the boy's neck. Whether memory or dreams, Berzelius feels a pull toward her own past and set out to find out who's responsible, staying one step ahead of the police. Her whole career could be in jeopardy.
Schepp's premise is intriguing and the story has numerous twists and turns, but the plot moved too slowly to easily keep my attention. Schepp, like Roslund-Hellstrom, uses different viewpoints as well as flashback to tell her story. Perhaps the problem is in the translation, but many of the details don't move the story forward. Also, the dialog is awkward, and I couldn't find a character to like or root for in the bunch of them. I enjoy thrillers, and I particularly like thrillers with difficult topics at their core. Out of curiosity, I've read the synopsis of the sequel, MARKED FOR REVENGE, and it too, sounds intriguing. Whether or not, I will delve more into this series remains to be seen.
When a high-ranking head of the migration board is found
shot to death in his living room, there is no shortage of
suspects, including his wife. But no one expects to find the
mysterious child-sized handprint in the childless
home.
Public prosecutor Jana Berzelius steps in
to lead the investigation. Young and brilliant but
emotionally cold, Berzelius, like her famous prosecutor
father, won't be swayed by the hysterical widow or
intimidated by the threatening letters the victim had tried
to hide. Jana is steely, aloof, impenetrable. That is, until
the boyโฆ
A few days later on a nearby deserted
shoreline, the body of a preteen boy is discovered, and
with him, the murder weapon that killed him and the original
victim. Berzelius is drawn more deeply into the case for as
she attends his autopsy, she recognizes something strangely
familiar in his small, scarred, heroin-riddled body. Cut
deep into his flesh are initials that scream child
trafficking and trigger in her a flash of memory of her own
dark, fear-ridden past. Her connection to this boy has been
carved with deliberation and malice that penetrate to her
very core.
Now, to protect her own hidden past,
she must find the suspect behind these murders, before the
police do.
International bestselling author
Emelie Schepp introduces us to the enigmatic, unforgettable
Jana Berzelius in this first novel of a chilling trilogy.
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