Ysra Sigurdardottir - The Doll

Portuguese cover

It was meant to be a quiet family fishing trip, a chance for mother and daughter to talk. But it changes the course of their lives forever.
They catch nothing except a broken doll that gets tangled in the net. After years in the ocean, the doll a terrifying sight and the mother's first instinct is to throw it back, but she relents when her daughter pleads to keep it. This simple act of kindness proves fatal. That evening, the mother posts a picture of the doll on social media. By the morning, she is dead and the doll has disappeared.
Several years later and Detective Huldar is in his least favourite place - on a boat in rough waters, searching for possible human remains. However, identifying the skeleton they find on the seabed proves harder than initially thought, and Huldar must draw on psychologist Freyja's experience to help him. As the mystery of the unidentified body deepens, Huldar is also drawn into an investigation of a homeless drug addict's murder, and Freyja investigates a suspected case of child abuse at a foster care home.
What swiftly becomes clear is that the cases are linked through a single, missing, vulnerable witness: the young girl who wanted the doll all those years ago.

Comment: Back in August, I've read another book by this author, not realizing it was the 4th of a series. It was not the best book ever, but I liked it enough to feel interested in reading the next one, which is this one. Thankfully, it was possible to get it at the library.

In this new case, led by police detective Huldar and children's psychologist Freyja, they work along side others to solve the mystery of human remains which are found in the same location where, years ago, a doll was rescued from the waters on a fishing trip. The woman who kept the doll for her daughter died and doll went missing and now her daughter, who was placed in a home after that, seems to be missing as well. At the same time, a friend of this girl has come forward to accuse someone of abuse and they want to interview her to corroborate the boy's declarations. Could it be there some connection between these cases? Where is the girl? What happened when her mother died?

What I liked the most about the other book, which I could find here too, is the apparent simplicity of the writing. It's not a type of story with lots of fireworks and dramatic scenes but the author's style makes for a very engaging and fluid reading. Things are presented in easy ways, with just the needed information but somehow the author can make it all seem effortless and uneventful. I found it very easy to want to keep reading.

The story is quite interesting, in the sense that there are several things ongoing and as the plot moves along we discover many things are connected in ways that didn't seem possible at first. I mean, of course that was a given, this is a mystery case after all, but the clues coming together happened in a very precise way, without room for too many unnecessary elements. At the same time, we get to have a glimpse of the main characters' state of mind and where they are in their lives.

In this regard - the main characters' development - there isn't much to say, as I think the author has wanted the characters to be easy for us to empathize with and sympathize with as well, for they are all flawed but, deep down, good people. I think some things about them are hinted at and I can suppose the vagueness is on purpose, for this way any reader can reach a personal conclusion.

The case investigated was quite interesting and had some key elements to intrigue, something I can already guess is probably the author's trademark, namely the doll and the aura around it. I will confess I'm not a fan of horror movies with dolls and such, and here just the hint that the doll might be some kind of supernatural force was enough to add some thrill to the story, but the truth was way more human motivated... still, the connection between things was very well done, and proved to be a stimulating concept as the story moved along.

The mysterious aspects seem easy enough to solve at some point, but the explanation for some things is cleverly simple. People just cannot be trusted to be honest and morally acceptable, which is a pity but makes for intriguing suspense plots. There were some moments in which I felt sad for the situation presented and while I wasn't overly emotional about anything, it did make me think on the amount of possible similar situations happening the real world at any given time...

In the end, the police and Freyja solved the case but I can see why some readers found the plot to be slow and, at times, rather fortuitous in how some clues made sense so they could go to the next stage. I think these things could have been better, yes, but as a whole, it didn't ruin my experience of the story. 

I will likely read the next book in the series, which I think is the last featuring this cast of characters.

Grade: 7/10