Tuva Moodyson Mystery Series 3 Books Collection Set By Will Dean (Dark Pines, Red Snow, Black River)

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While this book can definitely be read as a standalone do be aware that it references a lot of content from the previous books, but it doesn’t name any names in terms of who did what.

Tuva Moodyson is now on my list of favourite characters- no doubt about that! After leaving London to help her mother, Tuva finds herself working in a small town newspaper office as a reporter. Tuva is deaf – though she can hear with the use of hearing aids. I love how she switches off her hearing aids when she wants to shut out the world. I also loved that she was determined that her hearing impairment doesn’t define her. I suspect there is a lot more for the reader to learn about this character, especially relating to her life in London as we really only scratch the surface – Eeeek! I can’t wait! Into all this, stumbles Tuva Moodyson, a deaf journalist who has moved to the nearby town to be close to her dying mother. With her hearing aids she hears perfectly well but delights in turning them off while she is writing or just wants to enjoy the silence. Tuva is a good journalist, hoping for a job with a national paper once she is free again to move to a big city, but she is scared of the deep, dark forest and this assignment will require her to face her fear as she investigates the residents of Mossen. If you're a regular bloke with a regular job, I get it. If you're a reporter, your phone, Ipad and camera are so crucial to doing your job that they should always be charging when not in use. In the small town where Tuva worked, the electronics weren't always in use. Bad Apples is noir at its very best… If you like “heart in your mouth” reads that will keep you up all night with all the lights on, then this is for you.’ Then you have the quirky, odd and realistic characters that live in and around Gavrik – from the sisters (my favourites!) with their extremely strange creative profession and their lilting way of talking to Tuva herself, everyone you meet in Dark Pines will give you a different emotional response. The mystery element is so so SO well done, I don’t even want to say anything about it, you should just read it and live in it and wait for that downright eerie ending that is elegantly achieved.

The compassionate and relentless Tuva becomes obsessed and dedicated to solving the crimes. This leads her to enter the dreaded forest on her own, desiring to overcome her greatest fear. She finds the forest even more terrifying and dangerous than she anticipated in her wildest imagination. I shouldn't. It makes things worse. My chest starts to convulse, I'm breathing too fast, my ribs hitting the ceiling and then retreating. Hitting and retreating.

and then I nudge my ponytail and switch on my hearing aids but then we are confronted with a very different narrator. The Tuva Moodyson series remains one of my favourite crime series and one I can’t get enough of. I hope that we will see a lot more of Tuva in future. Another strength of the novel is the intense and almost claustrophobic, picture it paints of the small town of Gavrik - with its hunting season, and close-knit small business community with a web of connections and histories between individuals. Rather than it just being a copycat pastiche of the many impressive Scandi crime novels out there, it turns out that Dean himself has left the U.K. and now lives in Sweden, so has some real experience to draw upon. Well, apparently I am in the minority here. I never found my way into the story. I also never connected to Tuva. To be honest, I did not like her. I found her actions and investigations quite stupid.Will sets us on a remote farm with a lovely name – Rose Farm – but despite Shakespeare saying “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet” this is not the case here. There is a smell – a dark, raw smell about the place. A murder suicide took place here many years ago. A father killed his entire family leaving only the baby behind. Some characters from the previous books return, including her best friend Tammy, Lars and Nils from the newsroom, Police Chief Bjorn Andersson, and police officer Thord. Tuva visits Noora, cared for in her mother's home. Both women sit with former officer Noora, but there is no response. I loved the descriptions of the Rose Farm and its occupants. The mysterious Abraham, which hasn’t been seen for years, the business like Therese, Abraham’s wife.

Charlotte Jones said: “ Will’s Tuva Moodyson mysteries are a delicious combination of darkly comic characters, heart-pounding tension and thrillingly unexpected outcomes. What drew me to them above all was the thoroughly modern character of Tuva herself. Not since Saga in The Bridge has there been such a compelling and unique heroine. I’m delighted that the bold and brilliant Rose Ayling-Ellis has agreed to bring Tuva to life in all her spiky, funny, messy glory.” I completely get the reference to Twin Peaks: it is a quirky deaf reporter instead of an FBI agent, but the rest is there: the inhospitable small town, the narrow minded mentality, the strangeness, the dilapidated hotel, the kinky cathouse, the simple police officer, you name it. Bad Apples is a chilling outing for Tuva Moodyson – unsettling from beginning to the very end, but leavened with dark humour. A compelling thriller that devoted fans and new readers will adore.’ With a wonderful main character, Tuva Moodyson, a deaf, bi-sexual reporter who has found herself relocated from London to Gavrik (Toytown) to be near her dying mother and working on a small local newspaper when a body is discovered deep in the forest in the middle of hunting season with the same signature as a serial killer from the 90’s. Determined to solve the crime herself, Tuva decides to investigate despite hating nature, elks, the forest, the dark, insects and small towns. Red Planet Pictures has optioned the rights to Will Dean’s Tuva Moodyson crime series and has brought Rose Ayling-Ellis on board to play the lead role.I really like this series, like the quirkiness of it and the tension which flows through every book. It is not a fast paced series, nor should it be as that would not fit the setting. It is atmospheric, the author using the landscape and, in this case, the seasons to full effect. The book is set towards the end of the really cold season, but there is still that sense of the darkness that envelops everything, setting a kind a of moody and eerie tone that when coupled with a community of people who can hunt and shoot with a stealth that cannot be matched, it really sets you on edge, not sure what to expect or when. There are certainly a lot of surprises in the book, as well as some elements which seem almost inevitable, and be prepared to be caught unaware when the truth of what happens is revealed as, in true Will Dean style, he takes us right to the edge with a high stakes, jeopardy laden ending that really gets the pulse pumping. The twist here being that the author – Will Dean – is not a Scandinavian but an Englishman living in Scandinavia, in fact in a wooden house he has built in a vast elk forest.

Nordic noir at it's finest! What a compelling story this was. This is a slow burning novel but never once did I lose interest. Our main character Tuva is a deaf, bi-sexual reporter whom I've become seriously attached to. She is such a wonderful character that you just can't help but root for her. The scenery depictions really sets the atmosphere of this novel. I almost felt like I was in Sweden while reading it. She meets with some hostility as the locals are concerned that her news articles show the village in an unfavourable light and blame her for scaring hunters away. She has made two female friends in the village which makes her time there less unbearable.The remote Swedish countryside in which this series is set is almost as major a character as Tuva herself. Filled with dark, menacing forests, it adds to the claustrophobic atmosphere Will Dean has created. And if you think that Rose Farm is a spot of brightness in the landscape, you might need to think again. It has a dark past, and is now a closed community, home to a half dozen survivalists.