When 19-year-old Smilla Holst, a member of a wealthy local family, and her ex-boyfriend Malik Mansour disappear without a trace, Detective Inspector Leonore Asker expects to lead the investigation as section head at Malmö’s Serious Crime Command. But she is unexpectedly replaced by Jonas Hellman, a rival detective from Stockholm with a personal score to settle, and relegated to the police headquarters’s basement as temporary chief of the Resources Unit. In this obscure department, nicknamed the Department of Lost Souls, odd, cold cases and odd employees linger in obscurity. But as Asker quickly discovers, her new colleagues display unusual talents that come in handy when she probes a strange case involving a model-railway club and the ominous placement of miniature figurines that represent missing people, including the latest two victims. While Hellman pursues a kidnapping angle, Asker becomes convinced that her Resources Unit predecessor, now hospitalized in a coma, was on the trail of a serial killer who preys on urban explorers who wander into abandoned structures like factories and underground military facilities. The best-selling author of “The Game” trilogy launches an exciting, atmospheric crime series that introduces an appealingly smart and tough female protagonist with a troubled backstory in the vein of Stieg Larsson’s Lisbeth Salander, although not quite as edgy. The twisty, spine-tingling mystery that unfolds is creepy and sinister, laced with a touch of dark Scandinavian folklore.
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