First Van Veeteren's team must deal with a headless corpse found rolled into an old carpet -- the body is missing its hands and feet as well. Van Veeteren is happy to step aside in this investigation, that is until the body is identified as a former athlete and twice-convicted murderer. Van Veeteren almost misses his abdominal surgery to take over the reins on this one.

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Another fast paced, brilliant thriller from Hakan Nesser and his superb creation, the wonderfully grumpy Van Veeteren.The twists and turns are like a roller coaster ride, just as I have come to expect from this utterly fantastic writer. This book is the third in the series which has been translated into English, but I think there are a few more in the intervening period which haven't, which is a shame really as they haven't really been released in order. No matter though, as these are utter clas...

Hmm. I bought this cheap from a charity shop because I'd heard of Nesser as one of the more famous Nordic Crime authors, and wanted (like I have with Jones Bo, Mankell, Adler Olsson, Lackberg etc.) to give him a try. I'm not sure whether this was representative of the rest of his oeuvre, but if it is.. I'm probably going to steer clear in future.There was nothing particularly terrible about this book - Van Veeteren solving an old mystery from his hospital bed whilst convalescing (and yes, weirdl...

Entertaining but anti-climax towards the end.

The Return by Hakan Nesser.Inspector Van Veeteren is scheduled for surgery. A portion of his colon is coming out due to cancer. A body has been found in a wooded area of a small quiet town. A body with no arms, legs or head. Who this person was has the whole dept; perplexed including Van Veeteren. The Inspector starts attempting to organize the pieces of information he's given by Munster while still in recovery after the surgery. Who this victim turns out to be and what became of his life prior

I have mixed feelings about this mystery, the 3rd Chief Inspector Van Veeteren mystery. It moved along nicely and I liked the cast of characters. The first part of the book featured the other police inspectors as Van Veeteren is in the hospital after having undergone surgery to remove part of his intestine. He follows the investigation via reports from one of the other inspectors. The book moves back and forth from the present, the investigation, to the past, various time frames, various people,...

The Return is the third outing in the highly acclaimed series featuring the grumpy and sardonic DCI Van Veeteren and whilst the suspense is admittedly fairly muted, a meticulously plotted case, deadpan humour and some prescient flashbacks will once again keep readers thoroughly entertained. Written in 1995 but not translated until 2007, the murder of a twice imprisoned man sees Van Veeteren in typical philosophical form, often bemusing his colleagues along the way.Opening in August, 1993 with th...

Very hard to see past the overt misogyny in this book from the murderer who kills because his wife is unable to have sex with him and other women reject him to the returned innocent prisoner who thinks his various girlfriends want him to beat them. Van Veeteren's treatment of one of the nursing staff as little more than a drinks slave was also very unpalatable.

This is my first introduction to Nesser and Inspector Van Veeteren. I enjoyed the story and the bits of humor throughout in the identification of the one testicle cadaver without a head, feet or hands. The Inspector reminded me a bit of Wallander also a flawed and grumpy detective. Leopold Verhaven a notorious double murderer is released from prison and goes home to his house in a village. Nine months later a six year old finds a wrapped up body in a ditch and an investigation begins while the I...

Van Veeteren has become a favourite character of mine, starting to get close to the iconic Harry Hole (Jo Nesbo). As per normal this book is beautifully written by Hakan Nesser. The plot is intriguing and keeps you guessing. Very recommended, and I would advise to read the books in order, this is number 3.

This book introduces a concept I've not seen before, "Klimke's Razor". Klimke's Razor is a simple guideline for civilized and intelligent behavior: "you can not demand more of any person you are talking to (in a civilized conversation) than you are prepared to give yourself." Regardless on what is learned, mysteries by Swedish authors should be relished for their own sake.

For some bizarre reason I started listening to this book while mowing a couple of summers ago and then dropped it and only recently came back to it. Bizarre because it’s it’s a good mystery with some bizarre events glued together by Chief Inspector Van Veetteren, known to his colleagues as “VV.” (When someone calls and asks to speak with a particular inspector on the case but can’t remember the name, he says, “you know, the unpleasant one, the really, really unpleasant one". He is immediately pu...

Based on the fact that this book got some really high reviews from some of my friends on Goodreads, I feel I must have either missed something at the beginning of this book; or, it has been too long since I read the previous book in this series; or something was lost in translation for me. First, there were too many detectives and names to keep track of and I had a hard time figuring out how our glorious Inspector Van Veeteren was able to figure out who the killer was at the end. The Inspector h...

This was my third book by the author and by now I was expecting a sudden ending with minimum explanation. I was also prepared to skim through the last 100 pages or so to understand Veeteran's reasoning. Also that Veeteran will have an intution that the readers know nothing about. Also that he will then try to build a case based on that intution. Yes, I was prepared to endure all of this since the author's writing-style keeps you interested :)I was reasonably satisfied in #1 and fully in #2, but

Questions, questions, and more questions. A never-ending procession of conversations and interviews and interrogations, every one of them at first glance just as pointless and unproductive as the last, auntil that important detail emerged. Most often when one least expected it. That link, that little unexpected reply . . .That sudden but faintly glowing sign in the darkenss that one couldn't afford to overlook. It was important not to rush past it in this overgrown thicket of irrelevant and t

The two Van Veeteren mysteries that I've read so far are pretty good. The characters are well developed, the plot unfolds slowly but interestingly, and the settings are well-described. But here's the real reason I read them, and will continue to do so....Irmgaard GellnachtUleczka WillmotKatrina BerenskayaJurg EschenmaaClaus MenhevernAndrea ValgreBert SchmaaJudge HeidelbluumLeopold VerhavenDr. BoegenmutterMaardemGoldenmaarsBlochbergGemejnteLinzhuisenKreugerlaanNeuwe BlattTelegraafAwesome, right?!...

I've been reading a lot of Scandinavian mystery novels recently (who knew there were enough of them to constitute an actual genre?) but this wasn't one of my favorites.I had a hard time keeping track of all of the people in the book (which wasn't entirely necessary, but distracted me all the same) because none of them really had any characteristics beyond "detective," "witness," "victim." I'm sure this would be easier if I followed the whole series through, though.I also found the jumps from one...

Hakan Nesser's Inspector Van Veeteren has something in common with P.D. James' Inspector Adam Dalgleish: neither is fully a team player - either with their fictional colleagues or their non-fictional audience. They both solve crimes with flashes of intuitive insight and/or secretive deductive reasoning that is never explained to their colleagues or shared with us, the readers (who would surely like to be able to figure out whodunnit themselves?) until the suspect has been nabbed. The things they...