After She's Gone by Camilla Grebe

After She's Gone
By Camilla Grebe
Published by Zaffre (March 2019)
I received an Advance Reader Copy from the publisher

Publisher's description

A case as cold as the season. A profiler who can't remember. A killer ready to strike again.

Psychological profiler Hanne Lagerlind-Schön and her partner, investigator Peter Lindgren are invited to the small, sleepy industrial town of Ormberg to investigate a cold case: ten years earlier a five-year-old girl's remains were found in a cairn near the town.

But when a recurring memory problem resurfaces, Hanne struggles to keep track of the case. She begins keeping a diary, noting down everything she is likely to forget to keep up appearances so she doesn't lose her job. 

When the body of a woman is found at the cairn and one of Hanne's shoes is found nearby covered in the victim's blood, can Hanne's diary hold the key to what happened? How does this new murder connect to their old one? 

How can you put together what happened when the pieces keep fading away?

My verdict
I really enjoy Nordic Noir and always welcome the opportunity to find a new author to add to my list.

After She's Gone is highly chilling, not just in plot but also in setting. Set in a small Swedish town and depopulated highly forested area, the story focuses on a cold case, in which a young girl's remains were found but never identified. This discovery in the past is soon linked to crimes in the present.

The plot is complex, though certainly not too complex to follow, and focuses on various contemporary issues (which I can't reveal as I don't want to give away any spoilers). As with all good Nordic Noir, the atmospheric setting and inclement weather are as essential to the plot as the characters themselves. I tried to read between the lines and solve the case myself.

After She's Gone offers everything I look for in good crime fiction - an intelligent multi-layered plot, intriguing mystery, well-developed characters, realistic dialogue and good writing. I haven't read the first book in the series and, while I did have a few questions about the main character, this can easily be read as a standalone.