Killing Moon – Jo Nesbo

When I read my first Harry Hole novel, some years ago, it was an entry partway through the series and I immediately bought all of the prior books. Jo Nesbo’s characters are complex and they grow and change and Harry is central to this. In Killing Moon, Nesbo is not hiding some of the key life events that preceded this Harry Hole adventure that sent him off to Los Angeles where he’s holed up in a seedy room going to a seedy bar and he befriend Lucille. Harry has one special gift that pretty much always saves him and also keeps him deep in the bottle. He cares about people so much, that once they are his humans, that he will do what is necessary to save them. And to save Lucille, Harry has to go home and work privately for a wealthy scoundrel who is implicated in a couple murders. Murders with unusual characteristics that certainly seem like a serial killer may be on the loose in Oslo. He pulls together a motley crew of people as his team, all at the bottom of something, each for different reasons. Perfect: Harry is at the bottom too. And next we watch the police, journalists, politicians and Harry and his crew mess up over and over. And we mess up with him because the murderer, who we know as Prim, early on, is never who we think he might be. Prim is creepy crawly and we know early that he is into some odd things, but not why. I was proud to have noticed one clue that stood out but I still didn’t solve it. I didn’t recognize it was a clue. A riveting read, as usual. Nesbo is consistent, his crimes are original, Harry’s struggles stay similar but his work on himself varies. His crew grows and changes with him, face danger with varying results that also are original yet consistent with their characters. You don’t get jarred by Jo Nesbo’s writing. He creates unbelievable people and crimes but makes them make sense. Great minor characters; Awesome science lessons; Great plot; Wow of an ending. You go Jo.