Someone
To Watch Over Me
Yrsa
Sigurdardottir
Minotaur Books, Feb 17 2015, $25.99
ISBN: 9781250051479
In Reykjavík, Jósteinn Karlsson retains attorney Thóra
Gudmondsdóttir to appeal the arson homicide conviction of his Down’s syndrome
friend Jakob Porbjarnardóttir. Karlsson insists
Jakob’s previous lawyer failed to use key evidence that pointed to someone else
as the fiery killer of five people.
Taking on the case, the attorney quickly finds two oddities. First an unknown source sends her texts that
lead Gudmondsdóttir to proof of rape and unwanted pregnancy, and several
financial felonies; which provide two potentially radically different motives
for the deadly inferno than what convicted Porbjarnardóttir; however those in
the know fearfully refuse to testify.
Second Karlsson seems to pop up everywhere her inquiry takes her.
The fifth Thóra Gudmondsdóttir mystery (see The Day Is Dark, Ashes to Dust, Last Rituals and My Soul To Take)
is a terrific legal thriller that brilliantly uses the horrific impact on the
lower classes by the country’s financial implosion to tell a tale of cover-up, avarice
and arson. Although the storyline is
overly complicated leading to stretches of passivity, Someone To Watch Over Me is
an absorbing Icelandic tale.
Harriet Klausner
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