#BlogTour: THE CHESTNUT MAN by Søren Sveistrup @JennyPlatt90 @MichaelJBooks

Publication: 10th January 2019 – Michael Joseph

One Tuesday in October, Rosa Hartung is returning to her job as minister for social affairs following a year’s leave of absence – granted after the dramatic disappearance of her twelve-year-old daughter. Linus Bekker, a mentally ill young man, confessed to her killing, but is unable to remember where he buried the various parts of her dismembered corpse.

On the same day Rosa returns to Parliament, a young single mother is found brutally murdered at her home in the suburbs of Copenhagen-she’s been tortured, and one hand has been cut off. Thulin and Hess, the detectives sent to investigate the crime, arrive at the address to find a figure made of chestnuts hanging from a playhouse nearby.
When yet another woman is murdered-this time with both hands missing-and another
chestnut figure is found, Thulin and Hess begin to suspect a connection with the
Hartung case. But what is it?

Thulin and Hess are racing against the clock, because its clear that the murderer is ona
mission that is far from over…

Welcome to my turn on the blog tour of THE CHESTNUT MAN. It’s my absolute pleasure to share my review of this chilling and addictive novel and I’d like to thank Jenny Platt and Michael Joseph for providing me with a copy of the book.

I loved everything about THE CHESTNUT MAN. And how can you not? With a gripping story, well-developed characters, and a noir atmosphere I found myself completely immersed in it and I devoured it in two days.

A series of horrible murders is shocking Copenaghen. Young women are brutally killed and the police arrives always too late. On the scene, they always find a doll, a man made of chestnuts. What’s its meaning? What’s the reason behind the murders? And why the murders seem to be connected to the disappearance, a year earlier, of the young daughter of the Ministry of Social Affairs?

The author created a cast of vividly drawn and multi-layered characters. The two main protagonists are the detectives working on the case, Naia Thulin and Mark Hess. Naia Thulin is a single mother, but we don’t know anything else about her personal life. She is strong-willed and determined and her life revolves around her job. She is a detective in the Homicide Squad, but she hopes to be transferred to the Cyber Crime Unit. Mark Hess is from Europal, but following a disciplinary case, he’s been temporarily relegated back to the Homicide Squad and he’s been partnered with Thulin, but none of them are happy about it. I loved those two characters and I really hope to read more about them.

Søren Sveistrup knows how to keep the suspense always high by constantly changing the points of views (from the detectives investigating the murders to the victims) and with short chapters that usually end with some sort of cliff-hanger or shocking revelations that made it almost impossible to put the book down. The murders are gruesome and some of the details may be a bit too graphic, but they fit perfectly with the bleak atmosphere of the novel.

Disturbing, fast-paced, and unpredictable, I was completely gripped by THE CHESTNUT MAN. It is an absolute must-read, a surprising debut novel, an unpredictable page-turner that will keep you on the edge of your seat from the first to the last page.

Søren Sveistrup is an internationally acclaimed scriptwriter of the Danish television phenomenon The Killing which won various international awards and sold in more than a hundred countries.

Søren Sveistrup (born 1968) holds a master of Literature and History from the University of Copenhagen and has graduated as script writer from the Danish Film School.