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Title: Plodding procedural-- the Detective is pooped and so am I
Review: Detective Kurt Wallander is professionally cautious and thoughtful (dull), personally abrupt, a bit on the insensitive side. Wallander struggles to accept his father's death, and wonders if he can build a new life for himself, maybe remarry, maybe buy a house and a dog. He philosophizes a bit about the apparent rise of violent crime in Sweden. It crosses his mind more than once to give up police work.This is probably more realistic than many detective stories, because there's no Sherlockian detection going on-- just a roomful of cops going over a collection of facts they've gone over more than once already. They're tired. They haven't had any sleep. You really feel their fatigue. And it takes the cops forever to notice clues, long after Mankell has revealed them to the reader. I wanted to scream, "Open the drawer!!! Would you look in the freakin' desk drawer!!!" and the like.
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