Lackberg’s stories are set in the fishing village of Fjallbacka, which is also the hometown of the author and is located on the western coast of Sweden about 140km north of Goteberg. It is not the quaint and scenic background of the village that drives this novel but rather its dark history that seems to shape the ways of life of its residents. And like most small towns, it is often the fear of what people might say that becomes a pervasive force.

The Ice Princess has multiple plots, multiple characters and multiple dysfunctional relationships;  all are brought to light as a result of the murder of Alex Wijkner, which had been set up to appear as a suicide. Alex lived with her husband Henrik in Goteberg but spent weekends at her house in Fjallbacka. Her family had moved from Fjallbacka when she was ten years old and her best friend during her childhood there had been Erica Falck.

Erica was back in the village as well sorting through her parents’ possessions. Her parents had just been killed in a car accident and she and her sister Anna inherited the home. Erica lived near Alex’s house and was embroiled in the investigation early as she had assisted the caretaker who had found the body.

 The course of the investigation headed by Detective Patrik Hedstrom finds its way through the friends Alex had before she moved. When the autopsy reveals she was pregnant and the police discover the father to be someone other than her husband, the search broadens.

Anders, a highly talent painter and one of the most disgusting of  the town drunks had been Alex’s frequent visitor,  but he is removed from the suspect list when his body is found in a position where suicide appears to be murder as well.

 Not to be overlooked is the surprise relationship of Alex’s ugly duckling younger sister Julie with one of the town’s wealthiest families, now shrunken by the unexplained disappearance of the older son, and the death of the father.

Many of these people, and others too numerous to mention, are hiding dysfunctional and abusive relationships which have fashioned their existences and their characters. Lackberg constructs a meticulously layered plot that eventually places them on a collision course that continually impacts the investigations in unexpected ways.

The author is doing so many things at so many levels in this story and it is extraordinary that a first time novelist could accomplish so much, with such success in her creation of this very memorable novel. It will be a challenge for even the most experienced mystery reader to identify the killer or killers, and one this reviewer could not meet.

--Thea Davis