THE NEXT STIEG LARSSON' INDEPENDENT. 'SOON THE FIRST SNOW WILL COME. A young boy wakes to find his mother missing. Their house is empty but outside in the garden he sees his mother's favourite scarf - wrapped around the neck of a snowman. AND THEN HE WILL APPEAR AGAIN. As Harry Hole and his team begin their investigation they discover that an alarming number of wives and mothers have gone missing over the years. AND WHEN THE SNOW IS GONE...When a second woman disappears it seems that Harry's worst suspicions are confirmed: for the first time in his career Harry finds himself confronted with a serial killer operating on his home turf...HE WILL HAVE TAKEN SOMEONE ELSE.'

About the Author

Jo Nesbo is a musician, songwriter, economist and author. His first crime novel featuring Harry Hole was published in Norway in 1997 and was an instant hit, winning the Glass Key Award for best Nordic crime novel (an accolade shared with Peter Hoeg, Henning Mankell and Stieg Larsson). The Snowman is the fifth of Nesbo's novels to be translated into English. Check out www.jonesbo.co.uk

Prizes

Beware the falling snow... The first snowfall in Oslo brings a series of gruesome murders, and Harry Hole is pitted against a brutal killer who will drive him to the edge.

Reviews

Norwegian detective Harry Hole is in a quandary-he's an expert on serial killers in a country that prides itself on not having any. Yet women are being murdered on the day of the first snowfall, their bodies enmeshed with or guarded by eerily watchful snowmen. Hole has to convince his peers that the murders are the work of a serial killer, so he tracks The Snowman. But soon questions arise-who is stalking whom? And for what purpose? Nesbo (The Devil's Star; Nemesis; The Redbreast) is also a musician and composer. His latest thriller reads like a symphony, from the thundering first chords that pull the reader into a magical world through the delicately enticing development in which motifs and story strands are woven together leading to a pounding, furious conclusion. VERDICT Nesbo is being hailed as the next Stieg Larsson or Henning Mankell; this work is being compared to Peter Hoeg's Smilla's Sense of Snow, among others. Apt comparisons, but they don't go far enough. This is simply the best detective novel this reviewer has read in years. [See Prepub Alert, 11/1/10; 150,000-copy first printing; six-city tour.]-David Clendinning, West Virginia State Univ. Lib., Institute (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

On a cold Norwegian night, a young boy named Jonas wakes to find his mother missing from their home. Outside, in Jonas's yard, stands a solitary snowman wearing his mother's favorite scarf. Brought in to investigate the disappearance is frayed-around-the-edges police detective Harry Hole, who soon learns he's dealing with a serial killer calling himself the Snowman. As Hole delves into the case, he begins to suspect the Snowman has been murdering women for years. And to make matters worse the killer has chosen Hole as his opponent in a deadly game of cat-and-mouse with twists and turns designed to drive the detective insane. Robin Sachs's cool, matter-of-fact narration fits the somber tone of Nesbo's thriller, his near whisper of a voice pulling the listener into the story as Hole desperately follows every lead in his efforts to stop the Snowman from killing again. Although Sachs skillfully brings all the book's characters to life, his portrayal of Hole shines the brightest: his depiction of Nesbo's nonconformist, borderline alcoholic, world-weary detective will leave listeners hungry for the next audiobook in the series. A Knopf hardcover. (May) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.