The Shadow District - Arnaldur Indridason

OLD CRIMES, NEW CONSEQUENCES

THE PAST
In wartime Reykjavik, a young woman is found strangled behind the National Theatre, a rough and dangerous area of the city known as 'the shadow district'. An Icelandic detective and a member of the American military police are on the trail of a brutal killer.

THE PRESENT
A 90-year-old man is discovered dead on his bed, smothered with his own pillow. Konrad, a former detective now bored with retirement, finds newspaper cuttings in the dead man's home reporting the shadow district murder that date back to the second world war. It's a crime that Konrad remembers, having grown up in the same neighbourhood.

A MISSING LINK
Why, after all this time, would an old crime resurface? Did the police arrest the wrong man? How are these cases linked across the decades? Will Konrad's link to the past help him solve the case and finally lay the ghosts of wartime Reykjavik to rest?

THE SHADOW DISTRICT IS THE FIRST IN A MAJOR NEW SERIES OF NOVELS FROM THE WORLDWIDE BESTSELLER ARNALDUR INDRIDASON

Arnaldur Indridason worked for many years as a journalist and critic before he began writing novels. His books have since sold over 13 million copies worldwide. Outside Iceland, he is best known for his crime novels featuring Erlendur and Sigurdur li, which are consistent bestsellers across Europe. The series has won numerous awards, including the Nordic Glass Key and the CWA Gold Dagger.

The Shadow District - the first book in the Reykjavk Wartime Mystery series - won the Premio RBA de Novela Negra, the world's most lucrative crime fiction prize.

This atmospheric tale covering 7 years is beautifully told
The Times - Marcel Berlins

Indridason is a skillful plotter with a firm grasp of how to tell a story to keep the reader guessing… I will certainly look out the next in the series
Nudge - Paul Burke