The Strange Case Of The Nordic Detectives
Saturday 16 Jan 2010

It's a truth universally acknowledged—in literary circles, at least—that gloomy novels don't sell. Inform a reader that the book in his or her hands tells a grim story about depressed characters in a bleak setting, and you'll see it dropped instantly in favor of some breathless thriller about secret messages implanted in famous paintings or a sentimental yarn about love that transcends time. There's one big exception, though: Take that wintery landscape and add a dead body, then take that mopey main character and make him a sleuth trying to figure out who's responsible for the corpse. Double check to make sure we're not far from the Arctic Circle, and suddenly you have the recipe for an international best seller.

Wall Street Journal.