Geiger by Gustaf Skördeman

Synopsis
The landline rings as Agneta is waving off her grandchildren. Just one word comes out of the receiver: ‘Geiger’.

For decades, Agneta has always known that this moment would come, but she is shaken. She knows what it means.

Retrieving her weapon from its hiding place, she attaches the silencer and creeps up behind her husband before pressing the barrel to his temple.

Then she squeezes the trigger and disappears – leaving behind her wallet and keys.

The extraordinary murder is not Sara Nowak’s case. But she was once close to those affected and, defying regulations, she joins the investigation. What Sara doesn’t know is that the mysterious codeword is just the first piece in the puzzle of an intricate and devastating plot fifty years in the making . . .

Review
Gieger is the debut novel from from Swedish writer Gustaf Skördeman, translated to English by Ian Giles. Agneta Borman, wife to one of Sweden’s most beloved television stars, Uncle Stellan, has spent the perfect week looking after her grandchildren. When the phone rings and she picks is up, one word, Geiger, takes her back in time and sees her resume an assignement she started fifty years ago. After shooting her husband in the head, Agneta leaves to finish her assignment. Sara Nowak is a police officer working on prostitution and the sex trade, but as a child she was spent her summers with Stellan and Agneta’s children, and as such is informed of Stellan’s murder. Sara may not be officially on the case, but she can’t help but look closer, and discovers that Sweden’s beloved Uncle Stellan was not what he first seemed.

Geiger reads like a classic spy thriller, with different political agencies and a plot that has it’s roots in the Cold War. The plot moves pretty quickly, between the police investigation and Agneta trying to finish her mission before she is caught. The historical context is absolitely fascinating, and obviously well researched. Gustaf Skördeman weaves the facts of the Cold War, the history of East Germany and Russia, into the plot without bogging the reader down, just adding to the interest of the book. In the present there is the investigation of Stellan’s death, with plenty of secrets and lies revealed, and a plot line that hurtles along to an ending I didn’t see coming.

The majority of the book is told from Sara’s point of view, as a friend of the family and as a police officer. I found her a complex character, dealing with many issues that face most women today; being a mother, wife, police officer, daughter, friend. Her work fighting the sex trade, and trying to help prostitutes ovbiously takes a toll on her life, even colouring her private life at home. Her anger at those who use girls for sex, and even after prosecution go back again, has left her with an anger that spills over putting her in trouble. Her realtionship with Stellan’s daughter’s Lottie and Malin, goes back to her childhood when her mother cleaned for them and she spent her summers playing with the ssister’s whilst their real friends were on holiday. Her determination into investigating Stellan’s murder starts as wanting to help the sister’s who she thought of as her second family, but revelations completely change her reasons, simply wanting to learn the truth of her childhood and what Stellan stood for. Sara does have some inferiority problems around Lottie and Malin, still trying to impress them with her position in the police, and that now she can help him. I don’t think Sara was likeable all the time, but I admired her determination, strength and moral compass that push her on everyday. Other chapters are from Agneta’s perspective, but I don’t want to say much about her story as it would give the plot away.

Geiger is an intriguing spy thriller, that captures the atmosphere of the Cold War and it’s continued contribution to history long after the Berlin War came down. Gustaf Skördeman’s plotting and characterisation is wonderful, capturing the present and past, and the nuances of his characters perfectly. There is a lot going on in this book which I loved, there was never a dull moment and I was kept on the edge of my set throughout. This really is an impressive debut novel, full of political intrigue, espionage and secrets a plenty.

I would like to thank Zaffre Books and Tracy Fenton from Compulsive Readers for the invite to be part of this blog tour in return for my honest review.