The Troubled Man (Unabridged) [Audio Download]

Well I suppose I should first admit that I am a fan of Mankell's famous Swedish detective, & I have read every book, in chronological order, over the last five years. For those of you who might be put off reading the Wallander books as you've seen the tv versions, please don't be. The dramatised tv & film versions are a vague shadow of the books.

I won't try to comment on 'The Troubled Man' in a way that would earn me a page in a Sunday paper book review, but simply describe it's impact on me.
It will sound strange, but I was reticent about starting to read the last Wallander novel. I think that because the series of Wallander novels have given me so much reading pleasure over the last few years, I was reluctant to reach the end of the line.

However once I turned the first page I found myself in a familiar scenario of not wanting to put the book down, as the progress of the flawed policeman continues to grab my attention. When I read the last page, I found myself incredibly saddened by the final fate that Mankell simply laid out for his detective. I can offer no explanation for my surreal emotion, other than to accept that over the years I have been completely drawn into the character, his strengths, weaknesses and fears.

Trying to be objective, I'm not sure how much I would have enjoyed this finale without understanding Wallander's history, and so my simple recommendation is that you initially read 'Faceless Killers' - the first Wallander novel - to start with, and if you enjoy it, follow the stories from there.

When you start reading `The Troubled Man' you can almost instantly tell from its style and delivery that this is going to be the last of the Kurt Wallander novels. Not because the ending of it all is given away from the start, and fear not I shall not give anything away here either, but because from the start Wallander seems incredibly reflective and nostalgic about his past and indeed his future. Initially this concerned me slightly. This wasn't going to be a case of an author spinning out the final instalment using as many words and random tangents as possible was it? No, is the answer. What Mankell uses this for is to show us just where our protagonist is in his head and why he takes on a case that really doesn't fall under his jurisdiction, though I could be wrong as I don't know the ins and outs of Sweden's legal system or its police procedures.

When Hakan von Enke suddenly vanishes on an April morning it is most out of character. However it is not a case which Wallander or his team are given and yet he gets himself embroiled in it all. This isn't for professional reasons; in fact it's all rather personal as his daughter Linda (now a police officer like her father) has met the man of her life, who happens to be Hakan von Enke's son. This could seem rather intangible but having read `Faceless Killers' and in the glimpses of back story we get we soon learn his and Linda's relationship has not always been good. Here is a father who desperately wants to keep that relationship and help, and possibly protect his daughter. As the mystery develops not only does Hakan's wife Louise go missing, but a political secret starts to come to light from the past as well as some more personal family secrets the von Enke's have been hiding. In fact these secrets from the past, which all evolves around the Cold War and Sweden's part in it (based around submarines as Hakan von Enke was in the navy as a commander) becomes an additional strand to the novel and one that interested me far more than I would have expected it to.

I did think that `The Troubled Man' could have done with a fair bit of editing. It seemed to go on with various sub-plots of crimes that Wallander sort of starts investigating, and then leaves in favour of this more personal case, seemed like padding. I also thought the characters slightly weaker, well lots of them vanished in fairness, in this novel. Wallander seemed fully built, if a bit solemn and self pitying (but then as the book goes on we see why), as did his daughter Linda, everyone else was a little more two dimensional, but maybe that is where me not having read all the series and previously followed all of the characters to this final dénouement comes into play. This is both a positive and a negative as it has made me want to go back and start again, but also disappointed me somewhat as I tend to think the best series are the ones you can pick up at any point. Even if normally I tend to read them in order.

Regardless of how good this book is or isn't, and I did find myself hooked apart from the odd ten pages or so every so often, people will be buying `The Troubled Man' in their droves. It's not the thriller that I was expecting, in fact it's darker and rather more depressing, than I had imagined but it is a solid crime novel.

It would seem that public, or maybe publisher, demand rather forced Mankell into one last Wallander novel. In interviews in the decade or so since the last one he had said he he thought that the series had run its course, and he didn't feel he had anything new to bring to the character. Indeed he had started out to create a new series featuring Wallander's daughter Linda. Only one book Before The Frost: A Linda Wallander Mystery billed as 'A Linda Wallander Mystery' was published before the actress who played the character in the Swedish Yellow Bird television series committed suicide. At that point Mankell stated he was so shocked and upset by the event that he couldn't write another. Strange then that so much of this book should feature not only Linda, but also her newborn child, her fiancé and his parents. Is he reopening the door to more Linda Wallander books? Time will tell.

The risk in continuing a series beyond its natural end is that the author starts to repeat himself and at worst descends into self parody. In this book Mankell definitely does the former, possibly deliberately, and comes dangerously close to the latter. I say the repetition may be deliberate as Wallander spends a lot of the time looking back over his past life and cases. There is some reference to most, if not all, the previous Wallander books, and there is even a nod in the direction of some of his other work, with one episode here bearing a great similarity to the basic premise of his stand alone novel, Italian Shoes. At times it was redolent of Scrooge being shown the major incidents of his life by The Ghost of Christmas Past. The (almost) self parody comes about as several times Wallander seems to have come to a dead end or be stumped by some piece of evidence, when suddenly and 'luckily' he has a friend or former acquaintance who is an expert in some obscure or esoteric subject. It reminded me of the old Miss Marple films of Margaret Rutherford, when she would be faced with some seemingly impossible predicament and then she would reveal that 'luckily' in her youth she had been the All England ladies fencing/showjumping/swimming/etc. champion. Again these friends and acquaintances of Wallander's have generally appeared in previous novels and that fact just stops the book stepping over the self parody line.

One last gripe, a few times, especially early in the book, Mankell seems to be pointing out to the reader that something is a significant clue rather than following his normal method of letting you figure it out for yourself. If it were a film or TV show the incident would be underscored by heavy handed music just before a scene change or advert break. I can only assume this is intended for the new readers the publicity surrounding this novel might attract.

Having said all of that, there is just enough of the old Wallander, and of a case, albeit outside of his formal duties, to keep fans happy. Well maybe 'happy' is not the correct word in the context of a Wallander, or any Mankell novel. Never uplifting, even at the best of times, there is an added poignancy to this one. I suppose I am glad I read it, and I am sure other fans will buy it, probably despite some reservations. If you have not read any of the previous books, this is definitely not the place to start, and my advice would be to go back to the first in the series, Faceless Killers, and work through them in order.

A final plea to publishers - Is it too much to ask for ALL pages, not just the recto, to be numbered, and at the bottom?