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In the exhilarating penultimate thriller of the New York Times and #1 internationally bestselling Department Q series, the team must hunt for a nefarious criminal who has slipped under the radar for decades. On her sixtieth birthday, a woman takes her own life. When the case lands on Detective Carl Mørck’s desk, he can’t imagine what this has to do with Department Q, Copenhagen’s cold cases division since the cause of death seems apparent. However, his superior, Marcus Jacobsen, is convinced that this is related to an unsolved case that has been plaguing him since 1988. At Marcus's behest, Carl and the Department Q gang—Rose, Assad, and Gordon—reluctantly begin to investigate. And they quickly discover that Marcus is onto something: Every two years for the past three decades, there have been unusual, impeccably timed deaths with connections between them that cannot be ignored, including mysterious piles of salt at the scenes. As the investigation goes deeper, it emerges that these "accidents" are in fact part of a sinister murder scheme. Faced with their toughest case yet, made only more difficult by COVID-19 restrictions and the challenges of their personal lives, the Department Q team must race to find the culprit before the next murder is committed, as it is becoming increasingly clear that the killer is far from finished.
Featured Series
10 primary booksDepartment Q is a 10-book series with 10 released primary works first released in 2007 with contributions by Jussi Adler-Olsen.
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The Shadow Murders is the 9th, and penultimate, book in the Department Q series, and my favourite to date.
Department Q is the cold case department of the Copenhagen police force, headed up by Carl Mørck, who is ably assisted by Rose, Gordon and Assad.
The Shadow Murders is set in 2020, during the Covid19 pandemic, and Denmark is going into lockdown again, a few days before Christmas. Carl and his team are looking into a murder some thirty years old, but then a more recent murder occurs that appears to be connected.
What follows is the most complex investigation ever carried out by the team.
Meanwhile, Carl's past catches up with him. The final chapter ends on a cliffhanger, setting the scene for the next, and final book.
Engaging, thrilling, with a complex plot, The Shadow Murders is everything I want in a crime thriller.