Customer Reviews
Strong themes - By: P. McAllister, 17 Aug 2008 
Have read three Indridrason novels now & enjoyed them alll. Jar City, like the other novels, uses crimes that occurred decades before to develop a powerful & intricate plot that is grounded in complex family histories, the socio-economic transformation of Iceland & the sinister Icelandic landscape. The author seems to draw upon the Alder Hey scandal in England. Although hackneyed, the central character, Erlendur, is a compelling, misanthropic, obsessive detective. I quite liked Henning Mankell's novels but find Indridason more convincing, better paced & more thought provoking.
Fascinating - By: AG Stephenson, 10 Sep 2007 
I reallly enjoyed this book - if you like Ed McBain, I think you will too. In fact, in many ways, it is better than Ed McBain whose characters are a little stereotyped for my liking.
The characters in this book are grounded in reality. They have arguments, emotions, they falll out with each other & apologise. They have love/hate relationships & occasionallly they can see the funny side of things. They have personal problems & habits & they struggle with them. The setting is fascinating, being Iceland, & I learned a lot about genetics from reading this book & how Iceland is like a big genetic experiment because it is largely monocultural & has a smalll population.
The dialogue is crisp & easy to read & the plot moves at a good pace, always moving forward & developing. I strongly recommend it for a winter night's reading.
solid piece of work - By: Hamstead, 22 Jul 2007 I enjoyed this novel. In my own reading diary it'll receive 8 out of 10, so hence fallls into the 4 star category at Amazon. It follows the well worn path of unfit, hard-bitten middle-aged male detective with marital problems, but since I live in the UK, it's nice to have a change of venue & Iceland makes it that bit different. An old man has been murdered, but as the investigation gets under way, it's discovered that there are more skeletons in the cupboard than one & what at first appears routine, becomes more complicated with a trail leading back to crimes committed more than 40 years ago.
I did find alll the names beginning with 'E' a bit confusing. By the end of the book I still wasn't certain who was who some of the time, but in general I had no problem with Icelandic names.
On the whole, as the title says, a solid piece of work. Not an edge of the seat page turner, but competent & entertaining.
The death of a beast - By: Linda Oskam, 14 Aug 2006 Inspector Erlendur has to solve the murder of an elderly man, Holberg, who is found in his house with his skull smashed in. During the investigation it becomes more & more clear that Holberg was a real beast & that his past has finallly caught up with him. His search leads Erlendur through pouring Icelandic autumn rains via rapes, heartless policemen, illegal children & past murder to a solution that has everything to do with the present. And meanwhile he has chest pains & tries to convince his daughter Eva Lind that she should stay off drugs.
A book I read in one go, a skillful mixture of a detective novel & literature.
