By Sue Turnbull
CRIME FICTION
The Thirst
JO NESBO
Harvill Secker, $32.99
Renegade Norwegian detective, Harry Hole, has come a long way since he stepped off a plane in Sydney on a case that would take him from Watson's Bay to Nimbin via a highly charged encounter with Indigenous politics. Ten books after The Bat, the all-but retired Harry is now firmly ensconced in Oslo where he has wrestled with alcoholism and bad people for more than 20 years in a series that has weathered many peaks and troughs. As has Harry, although here he starts out on a high.
A Nordic thriller with added bite.
Contrary to all expectations, the Oslo crime squad's former "drunk, arrogant enfant terrible" is happy, as we discover on page 67 when Harry makes his first appearance. By this stage, the hunt for a serial killer who favours cowboy boots and a set of iron dentures from Caracas is well advanced. Detective Inspector Katrine Bratt doesn't need Harry's help to follow the logic of the bite marks and the splinters under the victim's fingernails. Harry has taught her well and Katrine can read the signs.
The politically ambitious police chief Mikael Bellman, Harry's erstwhile arch enemy, is not convinced. And the devious Bellman's not above a spot of strategic blackmail in order to reel serial-killer hunter Harry back into the fray in the hopes of furthering his own career. Like all the best Nordic Noir, there's a political sub-plot bubbling in the background suggesting something rotten in the state of Norway.
As it happens the central plot featuring a psychotic killer with a proclivity for vampirism is by far the least interesting. It is, however, a fitting vehicle for Nesbo's ghoulish imagination and an unsettling account of the perils associated with the dating app Tinder. While the ping on your phone might register a match, it might also be an electronic death knell. Careful who you wish for.
And then there's Harry Hole himself, with his ugly handsome face, seductive voice and riveting stare as well as all those scars representing a history "of murder and mayhem written in flesh and blood". One can't help but think that Clint Eastwood in his Dirty Harry era would have been just right for this role, although possibly a tad too smooth.
The most gripping plotline is therefore that involving the threat to Harry's domestic bliss, his adored wife Rakel, and his adopted son, Oleg, who is now studying at the Police College. Oleg looks up to Harry, not just because he's so tall, and wants to follow in his footsteps. Except for the booze, that is.
Asked if he is still sober, Harry informs his boss that he is as dry as a Norwegian oil well. When it is pointed out that these are hardly dry, but rather waiting for the oil price to rise before they start to flow again, Harry agrees that that this was exactly the image he wished to convey. It's a major hook: will he or won't he start drinking again?
At times horrific and macabre, there are moments when The Thirst is positively jovial. Consider the endearing professor of psychology in a funny hat who has made vampirism his life's work and is more than happy to lecture everyone entertainingly on the topic. This is Nesbo at his most dark and playfully diverting.