The Mysterious Case of the Missing Writer
By Ragnar Jónasson
Minotaur/St. Martin’s Press, 320 pages.
★★★★
In 1926, mystery writer Agatha Christie disappeared for a dozen days. She showed up unharmed, but never explained her absence. Some have done extensive detective work and believe they have cracked the mystery, but it remains open for speculation.
What, pray tell, does this have to do with the new novel from Iceland’s most popular mystery writer, Ragnar Jónasson? The Mysterious Case of the Missing Writer pays homage to Christie and is written in the so-called Golden Age style popularized by Christie. It is sparse and sprinkled with humor, though devoid of Christie's ability to somehow imbue murder with an ineffable sweetness. In other words, Jónasson is a hard-boiled mystery writer. Another departure is that whereas Christie preferred a controlled approach to her mysteries, Jónasson’s work is complex, right down to moving between three time frames: the 60s, the 70s, and 2005. He even cribs from two earlier works, White Out and Death at the Sanatorium, but doesn't bother to explain back stories. (You don't need to read these first to understand Case of the Missing Writer.)
Helgi Reykdal works for the Criminal Investigation Division in Reykjavik, a job that would stress out just about anyone. His mind is overloaded and is trying to recharge his batteries at his family's bookstore in the countryside outside of the capital. Helgi is relatively young as detectives go, and harbors a secret he wishes to remain private. His previous girlfriend, Bergthora, was violent. What his colleagues think if they knew Helgi was found to have been battered by Bergthora and is under a restraining order? He doesn't even want his current girlfriend, Anita, to know the details. She's everything Bergthora was not: kind, calm, affectionate, curious, athletic....
Helgi is brought in from the wilds, as it were, because Élin Jónsdóttir is missing. His job is to find the famous crime novelist before word gets out, social media explodes, and the public works itself into a frenzy of fear and rumor. There may be nothing to any of this, but the disappearance is reported by her best friend Lovisa, a retired judge, who suspects something has happened with Élin because she failed to show for their weekly gabfest. The public imagines that Jónsdóttir has a jetsetter’s lifestyle and would cast suspicion on every glamorous or important person in the nation. Lovisa, however, reveals that despite what people believe, Élin is a shy homebody of rigid habits. Her publisher, Rut, confirms Lovisa's concerns and reasons for them. Even Élin’s accountant finds it out of character for her to simply drop out of sight without a word to her closest confidants.
On the other hand, Jónsdóttir publicly announced that her 10th murder mystery, Deadline, would be her last book. Helgi can't help but wonder why an aging mystery writer would need anyone's permission or advanced notice to go out on her own for a bit; after all, that’s what he did. But the more Helgi probes, the more he's inclined to entertain the probability that something deeper is afoot. The ideal situation would be that Élin is acting in accordance to plots in her books and has pulled a fast one by claiming she was done with writing. Is she holed up somewhere working on a new book? Or, as Helgi increasingly fears, has she been murdered?
Try cracking all those nuts if you are Helgi. He is back in Reykjavik, is being badgered by higher ups to solve the case, and is falling deeply in love with his new girlfriend Anita, who fears that Bergthora has been stalking her at work. She's not wrong about that! Bergthora insists that Helgi is still in love with her, and that they have sex together when Anita is busy. That's not true, but Helgi has little time to deal with this as he is hours away from resolving the Jónsdóttir case. He insists that Bergthora as annoying, but not a threat. He promises to deal with her very soon.
Will Helga find Élin? Will he lose the intelligent Anita to his workaholic lifestyle? Is Bergthora a sociopath? Find out for yourself in this gripping page turner. Jónasson’s book is well plotted and finishes with an absolutely shocking conclusion. Maybe you'll anticipate it or maybe you won't. Either way it lands like a left hook when you're looking right.
Thanks to Minotaur and NetGalley for a review copy. This book will be published in September but can be ordered now.
Rob Weir
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