∎ Download The Boy in the Suitcase A Nina Borg Novel Lene Kaaberbol Agnete Friis 9781569479810 Books

The Boy in the Suitcase A Nina Borg Novel Lene Kaaberbol Agnete Friis 9781569479810 Books

Download As PDF : The Boy in the Suitcase A Nina Borg Novel Lene Kaaberbol Agnete Friis 9781569479810 Books

The Boy in the Suitcase A Nina Borg Novel Lene Kaaberbol Agnete Friis 9781569479810 Books

I read this on Kindle, and there were some formatting issues (accented letters not appearing correctly) and choices (the first few words of new sections/chapters were a lighter color than the rest) that were a bit distracting, but I am not considering them in this review. There are also a few odd choices of phrase, which I attribute to this being a translated book (the story takes place primarily in Denmark, where it was originally published).

I was a bit lost at the beginning of the book, as it does take a nonlinear approach to storytelling, but quickly fell into the story of a woman, Nina Borg, who agrees to help out a friend with whom she’s sort of fallen out of touch by picking up a suitcase for her from a locker. Nina is shocked when she opens the suitcase and finds a naked toddler inside.

The rest of the book mainly consists of Nina trying to uncover the boy’s identity and how he came to be in the suitcase. I think the less you know about the mystery, the better you will enjoy watching it unfold.

The story hops around to viewpoints of several different characters, but aside from the spotty beginning, it really isn’t hard to differentiate them. The voices are unique, which I appreciated.

The pacing was handled well. This is a very intense read, and the stakes get higher and higher as time goes on. It is a very gripping thriller.

My main complaint with the novel is that several times we are told things about Nina and her past that are never fully explained. I’m not sure if this is something that was lost in translation, or if it is a part of her character that is more fully explored in later books in the series, but it is the reason I can only give this 4 out of 5 stars.

I would recommend to people who enjoy crime thrillers, translated works, and books involving children in peril.


Tags : The Boy in the Suitcase (A Nina Borg Novel) [Lene Kaaberbol, Agnete Friis] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Nina Borg, a Red Cross nurse, wife, and mother of two, is a compulsive do-gooder who can’t say no when someone asks for help—even when she knows better. When her estranged friend Karin leaves her a key to a public locker in the Copenhagen train station,Lene Kaaberbol, Agnete Friis,The Boy in the Suitcase (A Nina Borg Novel),Soho Crime,156947981X,Mystery & Detective - Women Sleuths,Crime,Crime;Fiction.,Denmark,Denmark;Fiction.,Mystery fiction.,Suspense fiction,Crime & mystery,DANISH (LANGUAGE) CONTEMPORARY FICTION,FICTION Mystery & Detective Hard-Boiled,FICTION Mystery & Detective International Mystery & Crime,FICTION Mystery & Detective Women Sleuths,Fiction,Fiction - Mystery Detective,Fiction-Mystery & Detective,FictionMystery & Detective - Women Sleuths,FictionThrillers - Crime,GENERAL,General Adult,MYSTERY AND SUSPENSE FICTION,Monograph Series, any,Mystery & Detective - International Mystery & Crime,Mystery & Detective - Women Sleuths,Mystery fiction,Mystery fiction.,MysterySuspense,Suspense fiction,Thrillers - Crime,United States,detective;hard-boiled;series;international;murder;red cross nurse;copenhagen;train station;nordic;noir;woman sleuth;family;money;psychological;social conscience;motherhood;immigration;Soho Crime 25;translation;lithuania;adoption;contemporary;danish;human trafficking;kidnapping;scandanavia;suspense;thriller;female leads;women in translation;nina borg;mystery;mystery books;mystery thriller suspense;mystery and thrillers;detective novels;women sleuths;crime books;fiction;mysteries;fiction books,FICTION Mystery & Detective Hard-Boiled,FICTION Mystery & Detective International Mystery & Crime,FICTION Mystery & Detective Women Sleuths,FictionMystery & Detective - Women Sleuths,FictionThrillers - Crime,Mystery & Detective - International Mystery & Crime,Thrillers - Crime,Fiction - Mystery Detective,Danish (Language) Contemporary Fiction,Mystery And Suspense Fiction,Mystery fiction,Fiction,MysterySuspense,Crime & mystery

The Boy in the Suitcase A Nina Borg Novel Lene Kaaberbol Agnete Friis 9781569479810 Books Reviews

Multiple plot scenarios going on. Switches between various scenes left gaps, was confusing and not well done. Abrupt ending that did not complete the many character's stories.
Felt like you ran into a brick wall. I almost wondered if my had not download the entire book!!!
Say what you will about Stieg Larsson's The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (I was a fan on the whole), but one of the most important things about the series for readers was the way it clued in the rest of the world to the growing Nordic noir movement. Bleak, morally complex, diving deeply into political and gender issues, and ripping off the outwardly placid faces of their countries to expose the dark deeds underneath, it's a genre that I'm glad finally made its way overseas, giving us the chance to see how other countries take on a genre that's so familiar to us.

Take The Boy in the Suitcase, by Agnete Friis and Lene Kaaberbøl, which introduces the character of Nina Borg, who the two women have gone on to write a number of books about. (Separately, Friis is a journalist and Kaaberbøl is a children's author.) The Boy in the Suitcase opens with its titular image, as Borg opens a suitcase she's retrieved from an airport, only to find a three-year-old boy shoved unconscious and left there. How he got there - and why - is the subject of the book, which immediately backtracks, following the boy's mother, the kidnapper, the man who ordered the kidnapping, and Borg, watching as each thread plays out and giving us bits of the story along the way, carefully doling out each revelation when it'll have the most impact.

As you might guess from that opening image, The Boy in the Suitcase is harrowing and intense, and that's not even getting into the way the book looks at the treatment of immigrants, misogyny, abused women, and more, weaving all of these themes into the book carefully while never getting too far away from its story. And while it becomes clear that this isn't a traditional child trafficking situation (thankfully), Kaaberbøl and Friis draw no small amount of suspense (and unease) from the questions about what the purpose is in abducting this child, leaving the actual answer - which is horrifying and yet completely logical, within the framework of the novel - until right near the end.

All of which makes this sound more like a traditional mystery than it is. Indeed, Friis and Kaaberbøl play this out unusually, keeping almost all of their threads separate until the novel's very end, never giving you the moment you'd expect where the "heroes" come together and trade information. The mother is constantly uncertain if her child is even alive; Nina has the child but doesn't even know his name; the kidnapper can't figure out where the child is or who has him; and the man behind it all is only aware that everything has gone wrong but doesn't know how. It's a book that unfolds in an incredibly odd style, with revelations coming but often not affecting the story, and so many main characters that it sometimes feels rushed when it comes to developing them.

Indeed, for a book that's nominally the first in the "Nina Borg" series, Nina herself feels like just one small piece of the novel. She's a compelling character, mind you, one whose experiences working with refugees and abused women have left her damaged and unable to cope with regular life, often going absurd lengths - and abandoning her family - to take on causes. That's an interesting hook for a character, giving Nina a blend of "dedicated knight" and "damaged hero" that we don't often get in female characters - in America, she's be the "cop who works too hard and can't leave the case at work." But here, Nina is a social worker whose experiences have left such a mark on her that she refuses to accept injustice, and often can't be a wife, a mother, or even an individual person - an interesting idea for a hero.

The Boy in the Suitcase is a riveting read, but it's an odd one, and not entirely satisfying; it feels so unusually constructed that you feel like the story is unfolding more for the reader than the characters, with none of them truly able to change or react to the situations. But none of that will make you able to put it down as Kaaberbøl and Friis turn the screws constantly, ratcheting up the tension and leaving you uneasy as to the fate not only of this child, but also of the various players in this disappearance. It's a great window into Nordic noir, though, and makes me curious to see what else the genre holds, to see if it's all this different, compelling, and rich.
I read this on , and there were some formatting issues (accented letters not appearing correctly) and choices (the first few words of new sections/chapters were a lighter color than the rest) that were a bit distracting, but I am not considering them in this review. There are also a few odd choices of phrase, which I attribute to this being a translated book (the story takes place primarily in Denmark, where it was originally published).

I was a bit lost at the beginning of the book, as it does take a nonlinear approach to storytelling, but quickly fell into the story of a woman, Nina Borg, who agrees to help out a friend with whom she’s sort of fallen out of touch by picking up a suitcase for her from a locker. Nina is shocked when she opens the suitcase and finds a naked toddler inside.

The rest of the book mainly consists of Nina trying to uncover the boy’s identity and how he came to be in the suitcase. I think the less you know about the mystery, the better you will enjoy watching it unfold.

The story hops around to viewpoints of several different characters, but aside from the spotty beginning, it really isn’t hard to differentiate them. The voices are unique, which I appreciated.

The pacing was handled well. This is a very intense read, and the stakes get higher and higher as time goes on. It is a very gripping thriller.

My main complaint with the novel is that several times we are told things about Nina and her past that are never fully explained. I’m not sure if this is something that was lost in translation, or if it is a part of her character that is more fully explored in later books in the series, but it is the reason I can only give this 4 out of 5 stars.

I would recommend to people who enjoy crime thrillers, translated works, and books involving children in peril.