Sister

Starred review from August 10, 2020
Early in Dahl’s outstanding seventh ensemble procedural (after 2018’s The Ice Swimmer), failing Oslo PI Frank Frølich, who still misses the police job he left in disgrace, meets with Aisha, a teenage refugee from Turkey with some sort of serious psychological illness. Aisha hopes Frank will help her find her missing sister, Sheyma, who moved to Norway in 2005 and became a hotel worker. Unless Aisha is reunited with her sister, the police will deport her to Istanbul, where she’s sure she’ll die or kill herself. Frank agrees to search for Sheyma for free, but he soon learns from Fredrik Andersen, the author of a book about a 1988 ferry fire that killed 159 people, that she’s in hiding and doesn’t want to be found. Through Fredrik, Frank becomes entangled in a possible insurance fraud case involving the ferry fire. A murder raises the ante. Both cases stall, making the world-weary Frank feel as if he’s a pawn in a much larger and more sinister game. This is a must for fans of Nordic noir. Agent: Anne Cathrine Eng, Gyldendal (Norway).