Review - Blood Song by Johana Gustawsson

Blood Song (Roy and Castells 3)
Johana Gustawsson (trans David Warriner)
Orenda Books, 19 July 2019 (e) September 2019 (PB)
PB, e, 272pp

I'm grateful to Orenda Books for an advance reading copy of this book to consider for review.

Johana Gustawsson's crime fighting pair, profiler Emily Roy and crime writer Alexis Castells, return together with Roy's protege Aliénor and the usual gang - Commissioner Bergström, Detective Olofsson, Castells' overbearing mother Mado. It's always a joy to meet them: Gustawsson has created a truly convincing cast of regular characters, convincing in their ramified relations - and not least, for their quirks and failings.

The events which bring everyone back to Falkenberg this time are though both happy and very sad. Alexis is preparing for her wedding - cue Mado issuing advice and generally taking charge - when Aliénor's family, who we have seen little of so far, is subject to a horrific attack. Emily - and then Alexis - offer to help with the investigation while supporting their friend. (I though Gustawsson's portrayal of Aliénor's, who has autism, reaction and feelings here was both sensitive and heartbreaking).

The investigation leads us into the world of fertility clinics and corrupt practices that take advantage of desperate would-be parents, while - as in the earlier books in this series - there are chapters set in the past, this time starting in 1930s Civil War Spain. That historical narrative is very grim, very hard reading, describing the brutality and murder inflicted by the victorious Fascists not only on Republican combatants and prisoners but on their families, for generation on generation.

Another strand of the story begins in 1990 with a woman who, at her grandson's baptism, unexpectedly faints and whose life goes to pieces after.

Of course these threads in the novel are all linked and it's Alexis's, Emily's and - heartbreakingly - Aliénor's task to work out how. As always, Gustawsson's description of how these different (and in their different ways, rather strange) women work together to solve the case. The portrayal is given heightened texture by being shown from different perspectives - there is Olofsson's rather sneering, dismissive attitude to both Emily and to Aliénor (who he privately things of as "Google") as well as Aliénor's own perspective, for example.

It's a book that is, despite the horrors described (not only the Spanish episodes but the present-day murder) quite, quite enthralling and compulsive. I'm so glad that this series continues, and I hope to see many more cases for Roy, Castells - and Lindbergh.

I'd like to add a personal note here. My father was in the RAF before and during the Second World War and was stationed for some time in Gibraltar doing photographic reconnaisance. I remember him telling me how gunfire would be heard during the night from the border - which was apparently the Fascist forces executing prisoners. It was believed they did this in order to intimidate the Gibralter residents and the British forces stationed there.  I never quite knew what to make of this, but after what I have read here - and Gustawsson provides a historical note to back up what she describes - I am rather inclined to believe this.

It's a sobering book all round but an excellently told story.

No pasarán!

For more about the book, including links to buy it, see the publisher's website here.

Blogtour review - Keeper by Johanna Gustawsson

Cover design by kid-ethic.com

Keeper (Roy and Castells 2)
Johana Gustawsson (translated by Maxim Jakubowski)
Orenda Books, 30 April 2018
PB, 298pp

Today I'm joining the blogtour for Keeper, the new book by Johana Gustawsson- almost (but not quite) at the tail end. Do have a look at the poster for the other reviews, there have been some excellent ones so far. I'm grateful to Orenda for a copy of this book to review and to Anne for inviting me onto the tour.

In this second outing for Scotland Yard criminal profiler Emily Roy and true-crime writer Alexis Castells, Gustawsson again roots a modern day crime in a historical evil. In Block 46, the shadow haunting the present was Nazi medical experiments inflicted on prisoners, in Keeper, it's the Whitechapel Murders of the 1880s (the Jack the Ripper murders).

(Full disclosure, I reviewed Block 46 here and I'm quoted - with lots of others - at the front of Keeper).

Johann Gustawsson

I was relieved that while, in this book, Gustawsson looks back to the 1880s, she doesn't try to unpick or "solve" those crimes (though a theory is mentioned). That road has been well trodden. Rather she places a character alongside the killings, allowing that evil, that taint, as it were, to flow forward. Alongside the narration of the modern day crime, we see Freya in Victorian London, and her descendants, showing how abuse and cruelty can flow forward. Never judgemental, Gustawsson nonetheless presents some pretty shocking scenes - like Block 46, this is not a book for the easily upset, unlike that book there is a theme here of specifically misogynistic violence (as you might expect given the Ripper connection.).

If you've read Block 46, you'l know how good Gustawsson is at drawing you into her world, centred on the relationship between Emily and Alexis. They are not an easy pairing - in Keeper they really fall out over a past case which Emily wants reopened, a case which closely concerns Alexis. It;s an example of how complete a world this is, both women come to the series well established, more as if this were book 7 or 8 than merely 2, not only in their different histories but in how their relationship works.

Again, as in Block 46, the story cuts between the UK and Sweden and Gustawsson assembles an impressive cast to investigate what soon turn out to be related murders of women. I was impressed by this cast, in particular by Aliénor Lindbergh, a young Swedish analyst who has Asperger's syndrome. As someone with a relative who has autism I appreciated the portrayal of Aliénor as a rounded individual, not a set of behaviours, and also that while talented - she's doing a demanding job - Gustawsson doesn't portray her as a genius.The rest of the team in Sweden are impressive too, especially Karla, a woman detective having to put up with a degree of sexist ribbing while more or less running an important case.

All in all this is a complex, well plotted and credible crime novel, with a real punch at the end. It develops its central characters, of whom I hope we'll soon see more, and brings (I hope) a new member to the regular team. And as ever Maxim Jakubowski's translation keeps the story flowing along in English while leaving just a slight edge to the language, giving a hint, no more, of "outside looking in" - a bit of distance, of mystery.

Really looking forward to Book 3.

Blogtour review - Block 46 by Johana Gustawsson

Block 46 (Roy and Castells 1)
Johana Gustawsson (trans Maxim Jakubowski)
Orenda Books, 31 May 2017
PB, 308pp

I'm grateful to the publisher for an advance copy of the book and to Anne for organising the tour (read her blog!)

This is the first in what's clearly intended to be a new crime series, featuring Canadian profiler ('Behavioural Insight Analyst' or BIA for short) Emily Roy and French true crime writer Alexis Castells, both currently based in London.

To add to the international flavour much of the action in this book takes place in Sweden, and its roots lie in the second world war German death camps. Roy and Castells need to untangle the threads of history while negotiating several different cultures, each with different expectations and assumptions.

The actual background to the book is as polyglot and interesting, it having been written and originally published in French and indeed having won several awards.

Johana Gustawsson

That's a lot of background, and I was slightly concerned that it could overwhelm the book itself. And indeed there is a fair bit or orientation needed on starting it. We're introduced to Emily and Alexis in a setting of swish Mayfair parties and an exclusive jewellery launch; we have a backstory going on starting in 1944 as Erich Ebner is flung into the living hell that was Buchenwald camp; there are crimes in London which require the introduction of detectives from Scotland Yard and then soon one in Sweden - so we also meet a gallery of Swedish police officers, including the lugubrious Olofsson (who really doesn't like Emily being brought in).

That is an awful lot to establish, and it's a credit to both Gustawsson's writing and plotting, and to Jakubowski's translation, that it works well (as with any detective story you need to pay close attention: but I take that as a given). The story is soon moving and with a tantalising narrative from the killer we begin to see, not the solution, but the shape of the puzzle that Roy and Castells will have to solve (and yes, we do have a crime writer and a profiler working a case where most of the active investigation takes place abroad - irregular as anything I suspect but just go with it, it works fine).

That puzzle relates long ago events in the titular Block 46 to a series of grotesque murders taking place in both England and Sweden. But how could they be linked?

There is a meaty, challenging mystery at the heart of this book, and some great characters. I liked Emily a lot - maybe a bit of a nerd, you'd think, perhaps even one of the now sometimes fashionable almost-autistic. Actually, I was relieved to discover, Gustawsson isn't using that trope, there's a different reason for Emily's slight social distance, one we only learn at the very end of the book. Like several other characters (including that annoying Olofsson) she has stuff she's getting over. Indeed the presence of this meant that at time the book read as though it was in the middle of a series, not the beginning, and I wouldn't be surprised to see Gustawsson go back and write a prequel or two since she's obviously mapped out a lot about her characters. (I, for one, want to hear more).

While covering some dark subjects this is an excellent read, and it becomes more and more compelling throughout. Jakubowski serves it well in his translation by NOT making it read everywhere just as though it had been originally written in English: there is actually a slight sense of cultural distance maintained which helps to build unease as the death toll grows and the detectives are forced out of their comfort zone.

So, overall, really a promising start to a series and, as I said, I can't wait to read more about Roy and Castells.