Back From the Dead by Heidi Amsinck
A Missing person … a headless corpse … Jensen is on the case.
June, and as Copenhagen swelters under record temperatures, a headless corpse surfaces in the murky harbour, landing a new case on the desk of DI Henrik Jungersen, just as his holiday is about to start.
Elsewhere in the city, Syrian refugee Aziz Almasi, driver to Esben Nørregaard MP has vanished. Fearing a link to shady contacts from his past, Nørregaard appeals to crime reporter Jensen to investigate.
Could the body in the harbour be Aziz? Jensen turns to former lover Henrik for help. As events spiral dangerously out of control, they are thrown together once more in a pursuit of evil, more dangerous than they either could have imagined.
About the author
Heidi Amsinck won the Danish Criminal Academy's Debut Award for My Name is Jensen (2021), the first book in a new series featuring Copenhagen reporter sleuth Jensen and her motley crew of helpers. She published her second Jensen novel, The Girl in Photo, in July 2022, with the third due out in February 2024. A journalist by background, Heidi spent many years covering Britain for the Danish press, including a spell as London Correspondent for the broadsheet daily Jyllands-Posten. She has written numerous short stories for BBC Radio 4, such as the three-story sets Danish Noir, Copenhagen Confidential and Copenhagen Curios, all produced by Sweet Talk and featuring in her collection Last Train to Helsingør (2018). Heidi's work has been translated from the original English into Danish, German and Czech.
Review
‘Back From the Dead’ is a thrilling and dark book that is full of humour, and brilliant characters and is completely engrossing! This is the third book in the series but it could be read as a standalone, but I thoroughly recommend reading the whole series. They are cracking reads and you have the benefit of knowing more about the character interactions and backgrounds. Also, I see this as a series which will go on for a long time so getting in at the start is always good!
The story is told from two different viewpoints, firstly the spunky journalist Jensen. She is having to deal with changes in the paper she works for as they are increasingly going digital, plus there have been a raft of redundancies which resulted in her actually being promoted to Chief Crime reporter. She is still working with her ‘intern’ Gustav who brings such a lightheartedness to this series. I adore him! We also see the story from DI Henrik Jungerson's viewpoint and he and Jensen have a complicated history.
Jenson has been asked by her friend and member of parliament, Esben Norregaard to help look into the disappearance of his driver Aziz. He wants to keep it under the radar as Aziz is very worried about him and his family being sent back to Syria. As Jensen looks into this, Henrik is investigating the discovery of a headless corpse. As the pair investigate the threads weave together to throw them into a dangerous investigation for both of them!
This was a the well-thought-out mystery that sent both Jensen and Henrik into various misdirections and wrong turns. The pace was excellent and built up to a thrilling conclusion. I flew through this book in one day as it's always a delight to return to Amsinck’s brilliant writing. I just could not put the book down, it was a real page-turner. Although it deals with some heavy and dark topics it has a lightness through the narrative and at times I was laughing out loud!
Let me know if you pick this one up!
