A review by flying_monkey
Crime Novel by Petri Tamminen, Kristian London

dark funny reflective slow-paced

• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

It probably seemed like a great idea - it is a great idea - to write a parody of dark and moody Finnish crime novels. And for a few pages, this seems like it might be the parody we were looking for: instead of tracking a serial killer, our self-doubting policeman protaganist is involved in a hopeless search for a man who isn't so much a criminal as somone who just systematically demoralizes people and makes them lose their mojo. But it's not enough to have an idea and I think that fundamentally that is all Tamminen had here. There's really nothing else. Our hero wanders around aimlessly in the dismal Finnish winter. He speculate about his wasted life and failed relationship. He wonders if he might have better luck with a Norwegian detective who writes to him about happiness. But of course he doesn't. Nothing continues to happen, but this author simply doesn't have the philosophical chops of some of the great existentialist masters of inaction, nor is he funny enough to carry us through the lack of story or insight.