Read more
Zusatztext “Will remind many of Henning Mankell both in its thematic intensity and dark tone.”— Publishers Weekly “Intricacy and suspense... the ending caught me by surprise.”— Kansas City Star "A splashy debut ... with some mind-bending twists near the end."— Houston Chronicle "The right measure of pathos! fear and suspense."— Rocky Mountain News "Rich in characterization ... [and] the ending packs a stunning surprise."— Boston Globe Informationen zum Autor Johan Theorin was born in 1963 in Gothenburg, Sweden, and has spent every summer of his life on northern Oland. He is a journalist and scriptwriter. His second novel, Night Blizzard , will be published by Delacorte in 2009. Klappentext Following in the footsteps of prize-winning authors Arnuldar Indridason and Henning Mankell comes a chilling new voice in European crime fiction. "Echoes From the Dead" is as chilling as it is psychologically acute--a gripping study of loss! sorrow! and true evil. Chapter One When her Father, Gerlof, rang one Monday evening in October, for the first time in almost a year, he made Julia think of bones, washed up onto a stony shore. Bones, white as mother-of-pearl, polished by the waves, almost luminous among the gray pebbles at the water's edge. Fragments of bone. Julia didn't know if they were actually there on the shore, but she had waited to see them for over twenty years. Earlier that same day, Julia had had a long conversation with the social security office, and it had gone just as badly as everything else this autumn, this year. As usual she had put off getting in touch with them for as long as possible in order to avoid hearing their sighs, and when she had finally called she was answered by a robotic machine asking for her personal ID number. When she had keyed in all the numbers, she was put through to the next step in the telephone network labyrinth, which was exactly the same as being put through to total emptiness. She had to stand there in the kitchen, looking out of the window and listening to a faint noise on the other end of the line, an almost inaudible rushing like the sound of distant running water. If Julia held her breath and pressed the receiver against her ear, she could sometimes hear spirit voices echoing in the distance. Sometimes they sounded muted, whispering; sometimes they were shrill and despairing. She was trapped in the ghostly world of the telephone lines, trapped among those pleading voices she sometimes heard from the kitchen fan when she was smoking. They echoed and mumbled through the building's ventilation system—she could hardly ever make out a single word, but she would still listen with great concentration. Just once she'd heard a woman's voice say with absolute clarity, It really is time now. She stood there by the kitchen window, listening to the rushing noise and looking out onto the street. It was cold and windy outside. Autumn-yellow birch leaves tore themselves away from the rain-soaked surface of the road and tried to escape from the wind. Along the sidewalk's edge lay a dark gray sludge of leaves, crushed to a pulp by car tires, which would never leave the ground again. She wondered if anybody she knew would pass by out there. Jens might come strolling around the corner at the end of the terrace, wearing a suit and tie like a real attorney, carrying his briefcase, his hair newly cut. Striding out, his gaze confident. He would see her at the window, stop in surprise on the sidewalk, then raise his arm, waving and smiling at her . . . The rushing noise suddenly disappeared, and a stressed-out voice filled her ear: "Social security. Inga." This wasn't the new person who was supposed to be dealing with Julia's case; her name was Magdalena. Or was it Madeleine? They'd never met. She ...
