The Writing on the Wall - Gunnar Staalesen

Varg Veum is a former social worker turned private detective in Bergen, Norway. His enquiries into the disappearance of a fifteen year old girl unearth a thriving teenage prostitution scene in the city and, Varg is convinced, indicate a connection with the death in mysterious circumstances of a prominent male judge found in a hotel room wearing women’s underwear. Before long, Varg finds himself deep within the seedy underbelly of Bergen’s criminal world. Purely in terms of its rating as a detective novel, “The Writing on the Wall” is little more than average; in Veum, Gunnar Staalesen has created a fairly engaging and believable hero but one that ...  Read the complete review