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The Absolution

A Menacing Icelandic Thriller, Gripping from Start to End

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The Absolution

By: Yrsa Sigurdardottir, Victoria Cribb
Narrated by: Lucy Paterson
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About this listen

All he wants is for them to say sorry....

In the latest novel from the Queen of Icelandic crime, Freyja and Huldar must stop a ruthless killer taking revenge on teenage bullies.

The first the police know of the crime is when clips are sent from the victim's Snapchat account, showing her begging for forgiveness. The CCTV at the cinema where she was working show her being dragged into the night by a masked killer. When the body is found, it is marked with a number 2....

Detective Huldar joins the murder investigation, bringing child psychologist Freyja on board to help question the murdered teenager's friends. Soon, they uncover that Stella was far from the angel people claim: a relentless bully, she made life miserable for those around her. Freyja suspects this led to her death - but she may be overly influenced by her own childhood. Huldar simply wants to find out if there is a first victim still waiting to be discovered.

Then another teenager goes missing, and more clips are sent. Freyja and Huldar can agree on two things at least: the truth is far from simple. And the killer is not done yet.

©2019 Yrsa Sigurdardottir (P)2019 Hodder & Stoughton Limited Crime Fiction Europe International Mystery & Crime Mystery Psychological Thriller & Suspense Crime Fiction Thriller Suspense

Critic reviews

"Yrsa remains the queen of Icelandic thriller writers." (Guardian)
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Usual good and high standard story by this author marred by narrator's heavy intrusive breathing.

Good story

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this is another outstanding story from yrsa that will not be an easy read as yet again we are witnessing a dark side of society through huldar and Freyas eyes.

another triumph

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I absolutely love this series of books. The characters of Hulldar and Freya are so interesting and have a depth more then you might think from the write ups. I find Edla a bit annoying sometimes but she is quite funny too with her biting comments.
The story carries an important message about how the consequences of bullying lasts much longer for the victim then people realise. Words are one of the most powerful weapons we have and we should be careful how we use them.
I'd also like to give a shout out to the narrator, I love how she brings the stories and characters to life. I don't really care if the accents are perfect or whatever, I always know who's talking and that's the main thing.
I would highly recommend this book and the previous ones in the series.

Fantastic

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Just lost interest as I neither cared about the characters or who committed the murders. I got within a couple of hours of the end and just could not justify wasting more time. It was hard to follow and did not really grip you - there were some moments where I became interested in the plot but somehow this kept dropping off. Just not enough there to make it interesting and characters who were decent but did not develop enough due to switches of attention. Really frustrating and a pity. Has the makings of a decent book but needs a re-write i would say

Couldn’t finish it

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I like this author and I enjoyed this hard hitting crime thriller but with all the characters and all the names… I was rather easily confused! Liked the outcome. Find the police detectives a bit too miserable a bunch though!

Good but you need to concentrate

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