Dark Music

I didn’t entirely know what to expect from Dark Music, the latest novel by Swedish author David Lagercrantz whose finery of style made it possible for him to continue Stieg Larsson’s iconic Millennium series. Yet I was sure of similar stylistic features and an intelligent gripping narration that would form the undercurrent of this dark, disturbing mystery.

The main plot revolves around events in July 2003 in Stockholm. Jamal Kabir, a young football referee and Afghan refugee, is murdered after a tense match, his skull crushed by a rock. Shockwaves reverberate through various parts of the society. Micaela Vargas, an ordinary community police officer who’s only 26 years old, is unexpectedly allowed to join the murder investigation.

As ever in a good thriller, controversial views and team dynamics are in full swing. The investigators seem to be very close to charging Costa, the disappointed father of one of the players, a man notorious for his serious anger issues. Martin Falkegren, the youngest assistant police commissioner in the country, wants to make his mark and begins to consider Kabir, known for his fight for the rights of boys to play football in Kabul, as some kind of terrorist. He hires Hans Rekke, Professor of Psychology at Stanford University, a respected psychologist, and specialist in interrogation techniques whose experience was widely used in US. Needless to say, the term interrogation techniques sounds devious and implies torture, and that’s what will eventually resurface as the main duo make progress.

The first meeting between Rekke and Vargas shows two opposite worlds in terms of upbringing, social and material status, and thinking. But there’s a connection between these two completely different individuals, and following changes in the team, a new working relationship begins. Vargas, born to Chilean political refugees, and whose two brothers are in the criminal underworld, lives in a tough neighbourhood and feels constant pressure to prove herself. Rekke, born into a rich Stockholm family with close ties to the government, appears to have it all when it comes to knowledge and prestige. However, he’s destroying himself.   

Lagercrantz doesn’t hide the inspiration derived from the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes and his famous observational skills. Hence Rekke and Vargas become the modern version of the Holmes and Watson partnership where their methods lead them to unearth deeply hidden links to global power games, the CIA and secret prisons.   

The story follows that of a fairly typical murder investigation while at the same time diving into the past and the present of the Taliban, and uncovering links to real historical events such as the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. I was totally gripped, although some paragraphs were difficult to read. Descriptions of depravity and pain felt quite graphic, even though they were sparse and necessary, adding a sense of doom to the background characterisation and thoughts.  

The sharp, slick translation by Ian Giles makes this complex and unsettling book a joy to read. The words just flow, and I became immersed in the language and the sense of urgency as the international drama played out. As Lagercrantz writes: ‘… the darkness not only conceals, it also transforms. Corrupts.’