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A review by veelaughtland
The Crow Girl by Erik Axl Sund, Wiveca Jongeneel, Håkan Axlander Sundquist, Elina van der Heijden, Jerker Eriksson
3.0
I requested this book from Harvill Secker in exchange for an honest review. Many thanks to the publisher for sending me this copy.
The Crow Girl is one of those books, much like A Little Life, that I have mixed feelings about. I enjoyed the reading experience for the most part: it was definitely a page turner, and I never felt the urge to put the book down. I was interested in the characters, and wanted to know how to story would resolve. However, there were a lot of issues that I had with this book, that really need to be taken into account.
The Crow Girl is a Swedish crime novel that focuses on a detective, Jeanette Kihlberg, who is trying to find the killer of numerous immigrant boys who have wound up dead around Sweden. Their bodies appear to have been mummified, and their genitals have been removed. To help her, she enlists the help of psychologist Sofia Zetterlund, to try and profile the killer.
This book has a fantastic premise that is right up my street. I love the whole Scandinavian-crime thing, with the surroundings and atmosphere being something that I love in a crime story. I also really liked the fact that this book was heavily focused on the psychological state of people, and how someone's past can affect their life in the future and their future actions. However, of course the portrayal of mental illness in this book was problematic in its portrayal.
Things I didn't like:
- Mental illness felt like a very black and white issue, which is misleading for those of us reading who may not have a full understanding of the conditions presented in this book. To me, with my limited knowledge of the subject, I still felt that the portrayal was too simplistic, and that we were being provided with a very negative view on those who suffer from the illness.
- The story was very disjointed. As far as I know, this was originally a trilogy, and it seems as though a great deal of content has been cut out from this particular translation, in an attempt to fit it into one volume. This was a massive mistake, as characters appear all over the place but don't feel like they have a real function, and plot points get thrown about without any real follow-through. It was both too long, and rushed. Three volume translation please.
- The characters were a little one-dimensional at times, and there was a great deal of repetition with the authors info-dumping information about the characters' feelings, rather than showing them.
I probably had more issues than this, but for a full review, please check out my video review on youtube at www.youtube.com/chboskyy
Overall, I'm glad I picked up this book, because there was a lot that I enjoyed about it. However, I can't ignore the fact that there were problems with it, and as this book was sent to me for review, I need to be honest in my review.
The Crow Girl is one of those books, much like A Little Life, that I have mixed feelings about. I enjoyed the reading experience for the most part: it was definitely a page turner, and I never felt the urge to put the book down. I was interested in the characters, and wanted to know how to story would resolve. However, there were a lot of issues that I had with this book, that really need to be taken into account.
The Crow Girl is a Swedish crime novel that focuses on a detective, Jeanette Kihlberg, who is trying to find the killer of numerous immigrant boys who have wound up dead around Sweden. Their bodies appear to have been mummified, and their genitals have been removed. To help her, she enlists the help of psychologist Sofia Zetterlund, to try and profile the killer.
This book has a fantastic premise that is right up my street. I love the whole Scandinavian-crime thing, with the surroundings and atmosphere being something that I love in a crime story. I also really liked the fact that this book was heavily focused on the psychological state of people, and how someone's past can affect their life in the future and their future actions. However, of course the portrayal of mental illness in this book was problematic in its portrayal.
Things I didn't like:
- Mental illness felt like a very black and white issue, which is misleading for those of us reading who may not have a full understanding of the conditions presented in this book. To me, with my limited knowledge of the subject, I still felt that the portrayal was too simplistic, and that we were being provided with a very negative view on those who suffer from the illness.
- The story was very disjointed. As far as I know, this was originally a trilogy, and it seems as though a great deal of content has been cut out from this particular translation, in an attempt to fit it into one volume. This was a massive mistake, as characters appear all over the place but don't feel like they have a real function, and plot points get thrown about without any real follow-through. It was both too long, and rushed. Three volume translation please.
- The characters were a little one-dimensional at times, and there was a great deal of repetition with the authors info-dumping information about the characters' feelings, rather than showing them.
I probably had more issues than this, but for a full review, please check out my video review on youtube at www.youtube.com/chboskyy
Overall, I'm glad I picked up this book, because there was a lot that I enjoyed about it. However, I can't ignore the fact that there were problems with it, and as this book was sent to me for review, I need to be honest in my review.