Summary (Good reads)
Ida Joner gets on her brand-new bike and sets off toward town. A good-natured, happy girl, she is looking forward to her tenth birthday. Thirty-five minutes after Ida should have come home, her mother starts to worry. She phones store owners, Ida’s friends, anyone who could have seen her. But no one has.
Suspicion immediately falls on Emil Mork, a local character who lives alone and hasn’t spoken since childhood. His mother insists on cleaning his house weekly—although she’s sometimes afraid of what she might find there. A mother’s worst nightmare in either case: to lose a child or to think a child capable of murder. As Ida’s relatives reach the breaking point and the media frenzy surrounding the case begins, Inspector Konrad Sejer is his usual calm and reassuring self. But he’s puzzled. And disturbed. This is the strangest case he’s seen in years.
My opinion
Black Seconds is the 6th novel in the Inspector Sejer-series. I read only one before, The Indian Bride, which was a gift of my husband. I stumbled upon this title in my ferocious and ravenous search in the library.
I wasn't too impressed. The praise on the back of my edition clearly exaggerated. It's a good book, don't get me wrong, but it hasn't given me that extra little spunk, like in the early novels of Nicci French.
The story was bland, devoid of surprises and from very early on it was clear who had done it. And yes, I did mean the so-called twist at the end.
Spoiler alert
From the moment his mother noticed her son had covered up his car, even though he told her he crashed it into something.
I didn't feel compassionate with the mother, she seemed to be a mere side-character anyway, from very early on. I didn't feel nothing, it was a book and I read it, let's leave it at that.
On my score table, it gets a 5 out of 10, which means mediocre.
