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Jar City: An Inspector Erlendur Novel
Jar City: An Inspector Erlendur Novel
Jar City: An Inspector Erlendur Novel
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Jar City: An Inspector Erlendur Novel

Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars

3.5/5

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From Gold Dagger Award--winning author Arnaldur Indridason comes a Reykjavík thriller introducing Inspector Erlendur

When a lonely old man is found dead in his Reykjavík flat, the only clues are a cryptic note left by the killer and a photograph of a young girl's grave. Inspector Erlendur discovers that many years ago the victim was accused, but not convicted, of an unsolved crime, a rape. Did the old man's past come back to haunt him? As Erlendur reopens this very cold case, he follows a trail of unusual forensic evidence, uncovering secrets that are much larger than the murder of one old man.

An international sensation, the Inspector Erlendur series has sold more than two million copies worldwide.

LanguageEnglish
Release dateSep 19, 2006
ISBN9781429994989
Jar City: An Inspector Erlendur Novel
Author

Arnaldur Indridason

ARNALDUR INDRIÐASON won the CWA Gold Dagger Award for Silence of the Grave and is the only author to win the Glass Key Award for Best Nordic Crime Novel two years in a row, for Jar City and Silence of the Grave. Strange Shores was nominated for the 2014 CWA Gold Dagger Award.

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Reviews for Jar City

Rating: 3.6941176470588237 out of 5 stars
3.5/5

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  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Nice twists and real developed characters.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    The plot is compelling. In 1999 Iceland passed legislation allowing a private company, deCode (now owned by US company, Amgen) to collect information about genetics, genealogy and health records of Icelanders. Indridason revolves his plot around this database. It is a clever plot that lingers after the novel is done, with its very significant issues about medical research, privacy and the robustness of security controls. The first half of the book is very slow moving as the lead detective, Inspector Erlunder, is set up as what I think of as the prototypical Nordic protagonist, divorced, alienated from his children, and an unknown puzzle to his colleagues. The second half picks up nicely as the loose threads start turning into real leads and a clearer plot. So if you're interested in a slice of life that is Iceland, hang in there for the first 150 pages or so and get ready for a very good ride to the end.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Solid mystery.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Bought this when it was recommended to me in a bookstore while on vacation in Iceland. A solid police procedural, and fun reading about all the places I had just visited.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    [Cross-posted to Knite Writes]Hm, I don’t have a whole lot to say about this one really. It was an okay crime novel with a few good twists, but I found it to be somewhat dull and boring at times. I also felt the plot moved far too slowly, and that most of the plot points could have been covered in half the pages. Also, the characters, especially the main characters, read as somewhat one-dimensional throughout the book, and I thought their development could have used a little more focus.Also, I know this isn’t the author’s fault, but I found the writing in this to be very flat and flavorless. I know translations are hard, especially from a ridiculously complicated language like Icelandic, but I feel like, if I’d read this book in its original language, it probably would have come off as a bit more interesting, even with the plot and characters the way they are. There was just something lacking in the prose, and I felt that, often times, the narration was somewhat awkwardly worded. I really think this book could use a better translation.Again, though, that’s not the author’s fault. But it is a factor a reader should consider before picking this up, so I feel the need to mention it.All in all, Jar City is really just…okay. It’s not particularly special on any front, and it doesn’t stick out among the dozens of bestselling entries in the Scandinavian crime thriller category.I’ve been told that some of the other books in this series are better than this one, so I might try another, but I certainly wouldn’t recommend this series on the basis of this book alone.Is It Worth Reading?If you like crime fiction, and you have nothing to read at the moment, go for it. If you’re looking for something a little more exciting, perhaps not.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Inspector Erlendur of Iceland heads a case involving the presumed murder of an older man in his flat. His body was left with their only clue - an obscure, three worded message.The reading of this, first in a series thriller, was a unique experience for me. There were quite a few elements that got in the way for this to be a truly satisfying experience. The writing was unlike most thrillers I have read, so I had to adjust to Indridason's style and the quietness of Iceland (even though it rained continuously). The translation did not feel spot on and I always have to acclimate myself to names and places outside of my country-sweet-country. And, the mystery itself was different. I watched Erlendur go off on tangents (purposeful tangents) and it made me feel unsteady. Even with all the new emotions, I still felt it was a good mystery. It purely was a matter of location and style of writing. They didn't make for a comfortable read, but not an unpleasant one either. I now have the ground work in place for when I pick up Silence of the Grave, the second in the series. I anticipate that being a better experience. (3.5/5)Originally posted on: "Thoughts of Joy..."
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Jar City by Arnaldur Indriðason; (4*)"Jar City" where hospitals, morgue's, forensic labs, etc store body organs, ...., yes, in jars.Happy, happy, joy, joy!~! Back to NOIR!I really liked this dark Scandinavian noir story about the cop, the victim (s) & the rapist. It has a good back story of chasing the forensics and how genetics can turn the tide of an investigation. Another new (to me) author in this genre.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Very intense. The characterization is strong; the relationship between Erlendur and Eva Lind is particularly affecting. Either the writing or the translation is just a tad clunky.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Arnaldur Indridason doesn't sugarcoat his protagonists with sweet personalities. They aren't perfect people with mundane lives. Inspector Erlender is a divorced father with a drug addicted daughter living on the fringe of society. She occasionally scrounges Erlender's flat for money or a meal. And like any parent who loves his child to the brink of insanity, Erlender takes whatever attention he can get from her. In the meantime, he has a murder to solve. An elderly man has been bashed in the head with an ashtray. It wasn't a robbery so who would want to kill a frail and quiet man in his 70s? As Erlender digs into the victim's past he uncovers horrible truths about the dead man. An unsolved cold case suddenly heats up and Erlender discovers just how complicated blood ties can be.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    A wonderful story with a certain lack of depth. Not filling enough for me, thanks. Could have been rewritten and supplemented into a 500 page book.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This was a very good story and refreshingly short in this age of overlong telephone directory books, but I didn't like the writing style, in particular his writing of speech. Everyone talks in questions all the time? That nobody ever answers? I am not a violent person but I wanted to throttle Erlendur's daughter within the first few pages. I may read more in this series, but there are many other books I wnat to read first.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Fantastic Read
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Unexpectedly clever. Poignant.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Tainted Blood by Arnaldur Indridason is my third book in this police procedural series. This is actually the first of the series and it's original title was Jar City. Detective Erlendur (Erlendur is his first name as in Iceland that is how people are referred to) is a burdened man, much like Harry Hole and Harry Bosch, but it doesn't take away from his police work.In Tainted Blood, a man is found murdered with a note pinned to his chest and the only odd thing the police find in his room is a photograph of a grave. The story shows how an act of violence changes the lives of more people than just the initial victim.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I'm giving this a 4-star rating instead of a 5-star rating simply because the genetics part of the story didn't hold my attention. But that's not the fault of the author. I just couldn't get into it. I failed to grasp the science behind the details of the genetics in this story. Which is my fault, for not being as well-informed about science as the author. The story is rather macabre, as it has to do with digging up bodies from graves, organs stored in jars in laboratories (the "Jar City" of the title), and a case of the sins of the fathers being visited upon the sons. Erlendur and his team of investigators (Elinborg and Sigurdur Oli) are called upon to solve the murder of an elderly man found bludgeoned to death in his basement apartment, which, by the way, has a very funky odor. It turns out that the elderly man was a career criminal, a rapist, who was never tried for his crimes. Erlendur suspects his murder had something to do his criminal past, and sets about digging into the man's past associates. He discovers old, long-held secrets, finds a long-buried body, and meets more than a few people tortured by their past, or by their parents' past history. I read this book in two days. I have to say, Indridason's novels hold my attention unlike anything I've read in a long time. I kept turning the pages, and I was up until 5 AM reading one night. I highly recommend this author.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    I actually think a better translator would have made this a better read. It just came across as very flat and simplistic in language. I liked the characters, and how they were set up, but the plot was easy to guess. I think I'll give the next in the series a try, and see if it is more absorbing.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    So far I've learned that listings in Icelandic phone books are by the first name.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    What made this book enjoyable was how such an intricate web was spun throughout the novel giving the reader enough interest to keep reading. I was not sure what to expect from this book. Although I’ve heard good things about it I didn’t think I would be so engrossed and be flying through the pages to find out what will happen next. I’m still not sure what to think of Erlandur as a character. Like most protagonists in series like these they usually have an underlying personal issue (whether it be health, or family for example) which he does have, but his personality I can’t really quite make out. He doesn’t seem to have much of one except he cares for his daughter and her well being even though they are estranged. He does have some sense of humor and wit but overall he appears to be driven by his work and hard working to solve the crime (we all need police like these don’t we?.)I’m liking how his relationship with his daughter is turning out. It’s nice to see them slowly step away from their estrangement and it shows they do truly care for each other even though it’s done through yelling (most families are like that though, aren’t they?) It shows a lot of tough love, and I’m hoping the best for Eva Lind in the next books (I hope she appears as I’m slowly starting to like her more.)What I enjoyed the most of this book was the plot like I mentioned earlier. It went from point A to point B but in such a dramatic motion it certainly kept you reading to find out what was going to happen next. The mood of the story also, was excellent. It was dark, dreary, melancholy, and although not suspenseful like the majority of the crime novels, it didn’t have to be. It made the setting suitable for the plot and made it more enjoyable. One little thing I do have to add though, is the side story with the bride. I’m not sure why that was mentioned as it had little to do with the main story and it seemed like a filler. It wasn’t necessary as the plot itself was fine without it. I also enjoyed the ending of the book. It was sad, but you came to the realization it had to come to an ending like this.As this is book #3 in its native language, it’s considered book #1 in its’ English translation. It seems all right and nothing seems to be lacking. Perhaps a bit of backstory might have helped but it was comprehensible to read. Greatly recommended! It’s a great break from the usual detective novels we have out there.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    This book was interesting in a way, but not entirely engaging. I felt as though everything that was happening was observed from a distance, not as though you were right in the middle of something gripping. Secondary characters weren't really rounded out and even the main character and his daughter didn't feel real. The story was ok and I did like reading a bit on a country I knew nothing about.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Best for:Fans of murder mysteries set in Iceland.In a nutshell:CN: Sexual AssaultDetective Erlendur is called to investigate the murder of an older man. As the investigation unfolds, he discovers a possible link to crimes the victim committed in the past.Worth quoting:N/AWhy I chose it:I like mysteries set in Iceland, and this series comes generally well-reviewed.Review:This book didn't exactly go where I expected it to, but it wasn't so outlandish that one couldn't start to figure it out. There are components that feel uniquily Icelandic (which I can't share because spoilers), but also some common themes one would expect in a crime novel. The entire book focuses on this one murder, but there are a couple of side stories, including an exploration of Erlendur's relationship with his daughter, who has a substance use disorder.Indriðason's writing style is pretty easy to follow, even for someone like me who has only been to Iceland once, is not used to the names and only has a passing understanding of the geography of the area. He's good at describing a scene (there's a part where they are looking closely inside a home, and I have such a vivid image of it even now), but also gets dialogue across easily - it doesn't feel overwritten, and it seems usually like yes, these people would likely say these words. Which frankly isn't always the case.I'm not entirely sure how I feel about the Detective. Divorced, absentee father ... seems like every other detective I can picture. But he doesn't seem to be a misogynist or sexist, so that's a nice change. He is genuinely pissed when he hears about how the sexual assault case was originally handled, and seems to have sympathy and empathy for the women he encounters in the book. But annoyingly pretty much all the women in the book that he encounters are suffering in some way. I mean, it's a crime novel, so duh. But there is a woman detective - Elinborg - who gets some time in the book and seems competent. I'm hoping she gets more coverage in future books in the series.Keep it / Recommend to a Friend / Donate it / Toss it:Donate it
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    Meh. If this is representative of the Scandinavian mystery/thriller genre as a whole, then I'm not sure what all the fuss is about. Not sure whether Indridason or translator are to blame for the flat, repetitive, passive tense sentences (ex: "He saw he was dead") that, for me, seriously deadened the affect of the characters and the author's attempts at building suspense. Add to this characters are neither unique nor particularly memorable, a plot that is neither mysterious nor thrilling, and extremely lame use of imagery (rainstorms infallibly worsen every time the inspector's outlook turns moody) and you'll have a sense of what you're in for. Based on the blurbs, the critics seem enamored of the novel's genetics subplot, but I felt the book didn't break any ground that hasn't already been widely - and more provocatively - explored by other writers. I gave this a try because every other book on the best seller list these days seems to be lifted from this genre. Alas, however, this is going straight to my discard pile, and I'm headed back to authors like Martin Cruz Smith, whose chilly mystery/thrillers set in Russia unfailingly deliver complex characters, subtle plots, and genuine moral ambiguity, all wrapped up in gorgeous prose.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This very intriguing novel introduces Inspector Elendur Sveinsson of the Reykjavik Police Department. Erlendur is in the throes of middle age and not in the best of health. He lives alone and has two troubled children, including a daughter who's in debt to drug dealers.An elderly man is murdered in his basement apartment and the killer leaves an enigmatic note lying on the body. Some of Erlender's colleagues believe that the victim, whose name is Holberg, was killed by someone attempting to rob him. But the note makes no sense in that context and Erlendur continues to look for another explanation.He discovers that over forty years earlier, Holberg had been accused of a particularly vicious rape but had not been convicted of the crime. Erlendur begins unraveling the tangled history of the victim's early life in the hope that it will shed some light on the mystery surrounding his death. The investigation resonates deeply in Erlendur's own life as he wrestles with the questions of family, love and obligation, both personally and in the crime he is investigating.Because of the setting and the general circumstances of Erlendur's life, this book has a very Scandinavian feel about it. It takes a while for the momentum to gather, but once it does the reader is off on a compelling ride through a very tangled and unusual mystery. It's hard to imagine a crime fiction reader who won't put this book down anxiously awaiting the arrival of the second Erlendur case.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    When I first discovered Indriðason, it was with Silence of the Grave (the book that comes after this one). I loved it and read through the rest of the series but for some reason, until now I had never come back to this 1st book (in English, 3rd in Icelandic). Indriðason has a wonderful way of weaving past and present in his stories; this one had less of the 'flashback' style but still blended past events with current ones. I was pleasantly surprised to find that Erlendur's daughter Eva has a significant part in this book.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A good detective thriller based in Iceland. The story is the best part of the book, with many twists and turns along with a very interesting ending. Inspector Erlendur is a solid main character, but there is something lacking in all of the characters Indridason create - a lack of real depth that would take this story to another level. While Jar City was an enjoyable story, it was missing that intangible quality that would lead me to continue the series. Solid but not engrossing.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I have not read contemporary crime novels for a long time, other than Donna Leon's Guido Brunetti crime novels set in Venice.Although the setting in Iceland and Inspector Erlendur's dysfunctional family may in some ways seem far from Leon's creation, they do in this fine novel seem very similar in concept.The crime story was fairly convincingly followed through and the setting is fresh. The character dynamic is unexceptional (obsessive policeman with home life), it is well described.Although some of the subject matter is disturbing, it was an enjoyable read.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Interesting, because it's set in Iceland, but otherwise it struck me as a fairly generic Scandinavian crime story. Nothing really special about it, but equally nothing really annoying - probably a good sort of book for a short flight or a hospital waiting room, but nothing to go out of your way for. It's a police procedural where the main character is pretty much interchangeable with all the other middle-aged, male Nordic detectives we know and love, whilst the plot is straight out of the Sjöwall and Wahlöö catalogue: an unsympathetic victim who turns out to have been murdered in revenge for a crime that a previous generation of police didn't bother to investigate properly.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Odd. Intriguing. The main character, Erlendur, is a bit gruff, but he started to grow on me. The last line of the book brought a tear to my eye.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    My first Icelandic murder mystery -- and It all seemed very country as a small town where everybody knows everybody and there are lots of little secrets, and plenty of gossip. No earthshaking scenes, a plausible story, and decent enough characters.

    Recommended via a book placeholder card for "Indridason in the "I" section at the library, referring me to the "A" authors, explaining something about Icelandic name/surname registry alphabetization customs. Who knew.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I liked the main story around murder, genetic disease and paternity but I am not sure about the characterisation and the subsidiary stories, which all seemed a little flat to me. Erlendur has potential as a detective but I found him too bland, too generic. More could also be done around the context, Iceland, and its idiosyncrasies. Perhaps it would work best as a TV series like the killing? Possible ...
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Iceland is a small rainy island, where nothong happens and even the murders are dull. Except this one.... At first glance it's just an old dirty man beaten to death for his money but inspector Erlendur soon discovers that it's nore than meets the eye. The clues lead him to the past where bloodlines hide a terrible secret....

Book preview

Jar City - Arnaldur Indridason

1

The words were written in pencil on a piece of paper placed on top of the body. Three words, incomprehensible to Erlendur.

It was the body of a man of about 70. He was lying on the floor on his right side, against the sofa in a small sitting room, wearing a blue shirt and fawn corduroy trousers. He wore slippers on his feet. His hair was starting to thin, almost completely grey. It was stained with blood from a large wound on his head. On the floor not far from the body was a big glass ashtray with sharp corners. It too was covered in blood. The coffee table had been overturned.

This was a basement flat in a two-storey house in Nordurmýri. It stood in a small garden enclosed on three sides by a stone wall. The trees had shed their leaves, which carpeted the garden and covered the ground, and the knotty branches stretched up towards the darkness of the sky. Along a gravel drive which led to the garage, Reykjavík CID were arriving at the scene. The District Medical Officer was expected, he would sign the death certificate. The body had been reported found about 15 minutes earlier. Erlendur, Detective Inspector with the Reykjavík police, was one of the first on the scene. He expected his colleague Sigurdur Óli any minute.

The October dusk spread over the city and the rain slapped around in the autumn wind. Someone had switched on a lamp which stood on a table in the sitting room and cast a gloomy light on the surroundings. In other respects nothing on the scene had been touched. The forensics team were setting up powerful fluorescent lights on a tripod to illuminate the flat. Erlendur noticed a bookcase and a worn suite of furniture, the overturned coffee table, an old desk in one corner, a carpet on the floor, blood on the carpet. The sitting room opened into the kitchen and another door led from it to the den and on to a small corridor where there were two rooms and a toilet.

The police had been notified by the upstairs neighbour. He had come home that afternoon after collecting his two boys from school and it struck him as strange to see the basement door wide open. He could see inside his neighbour’s flat and called out to discover whether he was in. There was no answer. He peered inside the flat and called his name again, but there was no response. They’d been living on the upper floor for several years but did not know the old man in the basement well. The elder son, 9 years old, was not as cautious as his father and quick as a flash he was in the neighbour’s sitting room. A moment later the child came back and said there was a dead man in the flat, and he really didn’t seem too perturbed by it.

You watch too many movies, the boy’s father said and cautiously made his way into the flat where he saw his neighbour lying dead on the sitting-room floor.

Erlendur knew the dead man’s name. It was on the doorbell. But to avoid the risk of making an idiot of himself he put on some thin rubber gloves and fished the man’s wallet out of a jacket hanging on a peg by the front doorway and found a payment card with a photograph on it. The man’s name was Holberg, 69 years old. Dead in his home. Presumed murdered.

Erlendur walked around the flat and pondered the simplest questions. That was his job: investigating the obvious. Forensics handled the mysterious. He could see no signs of a break-in, neither on the windows nor the doors. On first impression the man seemed to have let his assailant into the flat himself. The upstairs neighbours had left footprints all over the front hallway and sitting-room carpet when they came in out of the rain and the attacker must have done the same. Unless he took off his shoes by the front door. It looked to Erlendur as if he had been in too much of a rush to have had the chance to take off his shoes.

The forensic team had brought along a vacuum cleaner to collect the tiniest particles and granules from which to produce clues. They searched for fingerprints and mud that did not belong in the house. They looked for something extraneous. Something that had left destruction in its wake.

For all Erlendur could see, the man had shown his visitor no particular hospitality. He hadn’t made coffee. The percolator in the kitchen had apparently not been used in the past few hours. There were no signs of tea having been drunk, no cups taken out of the cupboards. Glasses stood untouched where they belonged. The murdered man had been the orderly type. Everything neat and tidy. Perhaps he did not know his assailant well. Perhaps the visitor had attacked him without any preamble, the moment the door opened. Without taking off his shoes.

Can you murder someone in your socks?

Erlendur looked all around and told himself that he really must organise his thoughts better.

In any case, the visitor had been in a hurry. He hadn’t bothered to close the door behind him. The attack itself showed signs of haste, as if it had come out of the blue and without warning. There were no signs of a scuffle in the flat. The man had apparently fallen straight to the floor, struck the coffee table and overturned it. On first impression everything else seemed untouched. Erlendur could see no sign that the flat had been robbed. All the cupboards were firmly closed, the drawers too, a fairly new computer and an old stereo where they belonged, the man’s jacket on a peg by the front doorway still contained his wallet, in it one 2000-crown note and two payment cards, one debit and the other credit.

It was as if the attacker had grabbed the first thing at hand and hit the man on the head. The ashtray was made of thick, green glass and weighed at least a kilo and a half, Erlendur thought. A murder weapon there for the taking. The assailant would hardly have brought it with him and left it behind on the sitting-room floor, covered in blood.

These were the obvious clues: The man had opened the door and invited his visitor in or at least walked with him into the sitting room. Probably he knew his visitor, but not necessarily. He was attacked with an ashtray, one hard blow and the assailant quickly made his getaway, leaving the front door open. As simple as that.

Apart from the message.

It was written on a sheet of ruled A4 paper that looked as if it had been torn from a spiral-bound exercise book and was the only clue that a premeditated murder had been committed here; it suggested that the visitor had entered the house with the express purpose of killing. The visitor hadn’t been seized suddenly by a mad urge to murder as he stood there on the sitting-room floor. He had entered the flat with the intention of committing a murder. He had written a message. Three words Erlendur could make neither head nor tail of. Had he written the message before going to the house? Another obvious question that needed answering. Erlendur went over to the desk in the corner of the sitting room. It was a sprawl of documents, bills, envelopes and papers. On top of them all lay a spiral-bound exercise book, the corner ripped from one page. He looked for a pencil that could have been used to write the message but couldn’t see one. Looking around the desk, he found one underneath. He did not touch anything. Looked and thought.

Isn’t this your typical Icelandic murder? asked Detective Sigurdur Óli who had entered the basement without Erlendur noticing him and was now standing beside the body.

What? said Erlendur, engrossed in his thoughts.

Squalid, pointless and committed without any attempt to hide it, change the clues or conceal the evidence.

Yes, said Erlendur. A pathetic Icelandic murder.

Unless he fell onto the table and hit his head on the ashtray, Sigurdur Óli said. Their colleague Elínborg was with him. Erlendur had tried to limit the movements of the police, forensics team and paramedics while he strode around the house, his head bowed beneath his hat.

And wrote an incomprehensible message as he fell? Erlendur said.

He could have been holding it in his hands.

Can you make anything of the message?

Maybe it’s God, Sigurdur Óli said. Maybe the murderer, I don’t know. The emphasis on the last word is intriguing. Capital letters for HIM.

It doesn’t look hurriedly written to me. The last word’s in block capitals but the first two are cursive. The visitor wasn’t hurried when he was writing this. But he didn’t close the door behind him. What does that mean? Attacks the man and runs out, but writes a cryptic note on a piece of paper and takes pains to emphasise the final word.

It must refer to him, Sigurdur Óli said. The body, I mean. It can’t refer to anyone else.

I don’t know, Erlendur said. What’s the point in leaving that sort of message behind and putting it on top of the body? What’s he trying to say by doing that? Is he telling us something? Is the murderer talking to himself? Is he talking to the victim?

A bloody nutter, Elínborg said, reaching down to pick up the message. Erlendur stopped her.

There may have been more than one of them, Sigurdur Óli said. Attackers, I mean.

Remember your gloves, Elínborg, Erlendur said, as if talking to a child. Don’t ruin the evidence.

The message was written out on the desk over there, he added, pointing at the corner. The paper was torn out of an exercise book owned by the victim.

There may have been more than one of them, Sigurdur Óli repeated. He thought he had hit on an interesting point.

Yes, yes, Erlendur said. Maybe.

A bit cold-hearted, Sigurdur Óli said. First you kill an old man and then you sit down to write a note. Doesn’t that take nerves of steel? Isn’t it a total bastard who does that sort of thing?

Or a fearless one, Elínborg said.

Or one with a Messiah complex, Erlendur said.

He stooped to pick up the message and studied it in silence.

One huge Messiah complex, he thought to himself.

2

Erlendur got back to the block of flats where he lived at around 10 p.m. and put a ready meal in the microwave to heat through. He stood and watched the meal revolving behind the glass. Better than television, he thought. Outside, the autumn winds howled, nothing but rain and darkness.

He thought about people who left messages and vanished. In such a situation, what would he possibly write? Who would he leave a message for? His daughter, Eva Lind, entered his mind. She had a drug addiction and would probably want to know if he had any money. She had become increasingly pushy in that respect. His son, Sindri Snaer, had recently completed a third period in rehab. The message to him would be simple: No more Hiroshima.

Erlendur smiled to himself as the microwave made three beeps. Not that he had ever thought of vanishing at all.

Erlendur and Sigurdur Óli had talked to the neighbour who found the body. His wife was home by then and talked about taking the boys away from the house and to her mother’s. The neighbour, whose name was Ólafur, had said that he and all his family, his wife and two sons, went to school and work every day at 8 a.m. and no-one came home until, at the earliest, 4 p.m. It was his job to fetch the boys from school. They hadn’t noticed anything unusual when they had left home that morning. The door to the man’s flat had been closed. They’d slept soundly the previous night. Heard nothing. They didn’t have much to do with their neighbour. To all intents and purposes he was a stranger, even though they had lived on the floor above him for several years.

The pathologist had yet to ascertain a precise time of death, but Erlendur imagined the murder had been committed around noon. In the busiest time of day as it was called. How could anyone even have the time for that these days? he thought to himself. A statement had been issued to the media that a man named Holberg aged about 70 had been found dead in his flat in Nordurmýri, probably murdered. Anyone who had noticed suspicious movements over the previous 24 hours in the area where Holberg lived was requested to contact the Reykjavík police.

Erlendur was roughly 50, divorced many years earlier, a father of two. He never let anyone sense that he couldn’t stand his children’s names. His ex-wife, with whom he had hardly spoken for more than two decades, thought they sounded sweet at the time. The divorce was a messy one and Erlendur had more or less lost touch with his children when they were young. They sought him out when they were older and he welcomed them, but regretted how they had turned out. He was particularly grieved by Eva Lind’s fate. Sindri Snaer had fared better. But only just.

He took his meal out of the microwave and sat at the kitchen table. It was a one-bedroom flat filled with books wherever there was any room to arrange them. Old family photographs hung on the walls showing his relatives in the East Fjords, where he was born. He had no photographs of himself or of his children. A battered old Nordmende television stood against one wall with an even more battered armchair in front of it. Erlendur kept the flat reasonably tidy with a minimum of cleaning.

He didn’t know exactly what it was that he ate. The ornate packaging promised something about oriental delights but the meal itself, concealed within some kind of pastry roll, tasted like hair oil. Erlendur pushed it away. He wondered whether he still had the rye bread he’d bought several days before. And the lamb pâté. Then the doorbell rang. Eva Lind had decided to drop in.

How’s it hanging? she asked as she darted in through the door and flopped onto the sofa in the sitting room. The way she talked irritated him.

Aiyee, Erlendur said, and closed the door. Don’t talk that nonsense to me.

I thought you wanted me to choose my words carefully, said Eva Lind, who had repeatedly been lectured about language by her father.

Say something sensible then.

It was difficult to tell which personality she was sporting this evening. Eva Lind was the best actress he’d ever known, although this didn’t say much as he never went to the theatre or cinema and mostly watched educational programmes on television. Eva Lind’s play was generally a family drama in one to three acts and dealt with the best way to get money out of her father. This didn’t happen very often because Eva Lind had her own ways of getting hold of money, which Erlendur preferred to know as little about as possible. But occasionally, when she didn’t have a goddamn cent, as she put it, she would turn to him.

Sometimes she was his little girl, snuggling up to him and purring like a cat. Sometimes she was on the brink of despair, stomping around the flat completely out of her mind, laying into him with accusations that he was a bad father for leaving her and Sindri Snaer when they were so young. She could also be coarse, and malicious and evil. But sometimes he thought she was her true self, almost normal, if indeed there is such a thing, and Erlendur felt he could talk to her like a human being.

She wore tattered jeans and a black leather bomber jacket. Her hair was short and jet black, she had two silver rings in her right eyebrow and a silver cross hanging from one ear. She’d had beautiful white teeth once but they were starting to show the signs: when she gave a wide smile it transpired that two upper ones were missing. She was very thin, and her face was drawn, with dark rings under the eyes. Erlendur sometimes felt he could see his own mother’s likeness in her. He cursed Eva Lind’s fate and blamed his own neglect for the way she had turned out.

I talked to Mum today. Or rather, she talked to me and asked if I would talk to you. Great having divorced parents.

Does your mother want something from me? Erlendur asked in surprise. After 20 years she still hated him. He’d caught just one glimpse of her in all that time and there had been no mistaking the loathing on her face. She’d spoken to him once about Sindri Snaer, but that was a conversation he preferred to forget.

She’s such a snobby bitch.

Don’t talk about your mother like that.

It’s about some filthy rich friends of hers from Gardabaer. Married their daughter off at the weekend and she just did a runner from the wedding. Really embarrassing. That was on Saturday and she hasn’t been in touch since. Mum was at the wedding and she’s knocked out by the scandal of it. I’m supposed to ask if you’ll talk to the parents. They don’t want to put an announcement in the papers, bloody snobs, but they know you’re in the CID and reckon they can do it all really hush-hush. I’m the one who’s supposed to ask you to talk to that crowd. Not Mum. You get it? Never!

Do you know these people?

Well, I wasn’t invited to the wedding party the little bimbo fucked up.

Did you know the girl then?

Hardly.

And where could she have run off to?

How should I know?

Erlendur shrugged.

I was thinking about you just a minute ago, he said.

Nice, Eva Lind said. I just happened to be wondering if…

I haven’t got any money, Erlendur said, sitting down in his armchair to face her. Are you hungry?

Eva Lind arched her back.

Why can’t I ever talk to you without you going on about money? she said and Erlendur felt as though she’d stolen his line.

And why can’t I ever talk to you, period?

"Oh, fuck

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