This is a complex murder mystery which captivates and keeps you guessing.
This is book 2 of a series and I was unable to obtain an English version of book 1 so I am unsure what background in character development that might have added to this book. I found there was enough information for me to not feel like I was too confused.

This story is narrated by a struggling writer who returns to Halland County in Sweden decades after an unsolved mystery of a man who claiming to a serial killer. He is desperate for distraction to revive his career after his marriage to Sara failed. He had remembered a cold case of a possible serial killer that seemed to occupy many investigators as a call comes in the same night the prime minister is murdered. This would become an obsession for Sven Jorgensson, an investigator who tries to make a connection between the self-proclaimed serial killer and the murder of the prime minister. After he retires, he encourages and assists his son, Vidar, who enters law enforcement as well to bond with his father.

When the writer returns home he finds that not much has changed except Vidar, who he finds disshelved in a bar looking very different than the man he knew 30 years ago. He had always admired him in high school who had called him "book moth" back then. He reflects the past when Vidar's father, Sven was a police officer. As he begins to dig up information from the past he speaks to retired police officer, Evy Carlen, 80 years-old and on her deathbed. She wanted to confide what happened many years ago to Sven and Vidar while investigating the unsolved mystery. What she reveals puts the writer on a path to uncover some hidden secrets and information surrounding the chaotic and rather botched investigation.

"BLAZE ME A SUN a serial killer in a small Swedish town commits his first murder the same night the prime minister is assassinated. This is a haunting, cinematic novel about the legacy of violence and a community's collective guilt by one of Scandinavia's most celebrated young crime writers."

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House for providing access to this book for review consideration. All comments expressed in my review are my honest and unbiased opinion. ( )

Impressive! Long, dark, brooding, tragic... everything you'd want in a high-quality Scandi noir. Can be slow-moving, and sometimes confusing as events jump back and forth across years, but patience is rewarded. More than just a police procedural, it explores depths of love, fear, loyalty, tragic and irredeemable error, fathers and sons, violence, and the burdens of all these things as carried by well-meaning people. And the sins and toxicity of the writer's life and metier. I look forward to his next one when they translate it. My one beef is that the bird on the eye-catching cover does NOT look like a white wagtail (which features in the story as an omen or harbinger of things to come). Not sure, but I *think* it's a Madagascan wagtail... ?! ( )

“The pursuit of truth could go on forever, or until all the survivors forgot there was any truth to be found. The truth was a fantasy. The truth never ended.” That is the long and short of Blaze Me A Sun. This is a story about a serial killer, his murders, those trying to piece it together, those who believe they have the answers and those who question the conclusions. It is a journey to find the truth about a Swedish crime drama examined from many angles and perspectives. Too many angles and perspectives and too many pages but a good story, expose, narration, obsession and a few other simulations. With some serious editing it could have been a great story.

Thank you Hogarth, Random House and NetGalley for a copy ( )

When Stieg Larsson's The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo was released, Scandinavian mysteries were "flavor of the month" for a while but their popularity finally waned. After reading Christoffer Carlsson's Blaze Me a Sun, I think a renaissance may be in order.

Although readers do learn what's going on from the novelist as he becomes fixated on the unsolved mysteries, they also see how Sven Jörgensson and his son Vidar become obsessed with finding the killer over a period of decades. As residents and witnesses are spoken to once again, Sven is seen to ignore his own health in favor of finding a killer. It is incomprehensible to him how something like this could happen in this quiet part of Sweden. His son Vidar finds himself examining his own father with the eyes of an inquisitor. Why was Sven charged with manslaughter by negligence? Did Sven actually know the identity of the killer? And while I was trying to unravel this mystery along with Sven, Vidar, and the writer, I was also learning a few things about Sweden as well, which is always the mark of a good book.

In Carlsson's Blaze Me a Sun, he says, "Everything could be uncovered. Everything could be brought to light. As long as you were stubborn enough and didn't give up." These three men are more than stubborn enough, and they do uncover everything... but are they correctly interpreting everything as they bring the facts to light? Can obsession warp a person's judgment? Carlsson not only knows how to write a compelling mystery, but he can also give readers plenty of food for thought. I'll be looking for more of his books. ( )

A page turner about how the past haunts the present told through the eyes of an author who returns to his childhood and becomes obsessed with an old crime. Atmospheric, great character development and plotting. ( )