Predictable, but loved Sweden.
Could have been 100 pages shorter.
Laboured certain plot points eg hearing aids
Too much effort taken to set up a trilogy rather than focussing on one good book.

Fans of Enger, Jonasson & Aldridge will love Dark Pines! A very descriptive, chilling murder mystery set in the forest will give you a slight case of the heebie jeebies but you’ll enjoy it! Tuva, the main character, is deaf and the insight of using hearing aids & every day life for her was an education.
I have to thank the author for sending me this signed copy from Sweden! 🌲🌲🌲

These books feel like something David Lynch would direct.
A small town filled with secrets, gruesome killings, a dense and virtually endless forest pocketed with a series of ever stranger mini villages full of characters who would be right at home in Twin Peaks. Some of whom might even seem a little odd amongst the Twin Peaks crowd.
So much of Scandi Noir is punctuated with pastries and reverent depictions of the brutal weather and natural beauty, Will Dean will tell you everything you wish you never knew about ticks. Seriously. He cannot be stopped. Don’t even ask about mosquitoes or flies or leaches.
Still I want to keep reading and reading from the safety of my chair. No murderers or ticks or trolls. And I want Wine Gums and Marabou chocolate.

“I’m looking down an elk and it’s looking up at me and neither one of us is moving and in a single breath I forgive it completely. It didn’t mean to take my Dad with its own life. It didn’t want to do that, there was no plan.” p252

Dark Woods is beautifully dark, forboding and ominously captivating. Author Will Dean has captured so much of the essence of Scandi Noir in this, the first of the Tuva Moodyson series. It’s been on my TBR shelf for good couple of years and after I read the authors book, The Last Thing to Burn last year I was determined to ensure this book made it to my read shelf. And I’m glad I did.

The first thing that jumps out in Dark Woods is atmosphere and place. The opening pages are filled with an encounter with an adult elk on the edges of Utgard Forest, adjacent to a remote Swedish town, Gavrik. The elk and the forest are real yet symbolic throughout, and feature as both the source of fear and tragedy for Tuva and the very components that are a part of her redemption. I love that symbolism - tried and true - yet Will Dean handles it beautifully and respectfully.

Tuva Moodyson is an intriguing main character, journalist for a local newspaper in Gavrik.. small town, set in its ways, where everyone knows everyone. I love the way Will Dean has created Tuva as a deaf woman, losing her hearing through meningitis at a young age, dependent on hearing aids to access sound. We are given a privileged glimpse into the barriers, internal and external that Tuva endures and has endured. And along with the death of her dad and her Mums terminal illness, Tuva has a lot going on.

Dark Woods is almost like a closed room murder mystery and cold case rolled into one. The motley crew who live in Mossen village are all suspects in two gruesome murder cases that are a repeat of similar murders twenty years earlier. The woods grow darker and more menacing as Tuva uncovers the truth.

I really loved this story. There was something about the final wrap up I didn’t love.. it was kind of a let down for me.. I was waiting for a slightly different outcome that didn’t arrive.

Nevertheless 4 fat stars..

I really really enjoyed this, a really interesting lead character supported by an eclectic cast, a small town with lots of secrets and wonderful descriptions of hauntingly beautiful scenery.
A really well written and entertaining read.

Good book, tense but not super twisty. Loved a deaf, bi protagonist ☝️. A fair few SPG mistakes weirdly which pulled me out a bit.

A very atmospheric Swedish crime story, love the description of the forest, and Tuva is a great main character. The audiobook is fab as well, the narrator is Swedish as well so it’s perfect!

Plot: In the forest of an isolated Swedish town during hunting season, with gunshots ringing left, right and centre, a body is found. And this isn’t a first: the town was home to the “Medusa” murders in the 1990s where bodies turned up with their eyes missing. Tuva is a deaf reporter who hates the forest and longs to return to the city, but this is a story that could make her career. Are the murders connected and can she find the root of it all?

My thoughts: I know a lot of people love this and it’s been very popular, but I’m sorry – I just wasn’t a massive fan! Normally I love isolated landscapes like this but I think I struggled to identify with someone who found the setting in the forest scary rather than somewhere to explore and who longed to be back in the city, and that’s so much unlike me. I can totally understand the fear of a murderer being out there in the woods, but most of the time the fear was of the woods themselves not the murderer. I also love a good murder mystery or crime thriller, but this didn’t hold enough intrigue for me – I ended up not even all that fussed about knowing who the murderer was! I tried hard to take my time and get into it at first but I ended up rushing through parts as I got further in as I just wasn’t really connecting. I can understand why people like it, but sadly just not for me!
There were of course some good parts: the medley of characters throughout were certainly interesting, from the sisters who make trolls in the woods to the strange taxi driver with a young son. I also enjoyed having a main character who differed from the usual, being a deaf reporter but not forcing this as a plot device.