Be Adventurous!

When I first got into reading, I was one of those who was skeptical of each and every "new" book that I came across. I can't explain what might have been going through my head at the time, but I was new to the hobby and not alone in my fear of reading something I wouldn't like. A lot of people still suffer from this, fortunately I broke out of it once I ran through every single book by four authors. I began with RL Stine, moved onto Christopher Pike, then Richie Tankersly Cusick, and finally Dean Koontz.

Yep, after that I had to broaden my reading horizons. I was in middle school at the time and obviously there was still a world of books to discover (something that never changes). 

By the time I had my driver's license, I had learned that almost any bribe could earn me books. I blame it on my mom who, when I was 13, would promise me books in exchange for helping babysit my three little sisters. Anyway, it was around that time that I really started to explore new release sections and got completely hooked on hardcovers! Expensive habit to have. It's easier to be adventurous with someone else's money! I do have to say that this was all before I started my first job, and once I had started working, all of my money went to books. 

To the point. My newly discovered adventurous tendency to randomly pick up and buy books by authors I had never heard of (ah, my favorite thing to do these days) happened to coincide with what I believe was the beginning of the Scandinavian craze. There is no doubt today that Scandinavian authors have dug a niche for themselves in the mystery genre. They have a style that is completely their own - something you can detect almost from page one. It's hard to explain, but it's there. 

The book pictured above is a title called Blackwater by Kerstin Ekman, a book that is amazingly still in print today! It was about a mother and daughter who find the bodies of two murder victims in the woods. The daughter grows up and the murder is still unsolved, but a series of events is about to change all of that. Another discovery I made around the same time was Peter Hoeg's Smilla's Sense of Snow. I loved both the book and the movie.

Since then, there has been an explosion of these releases. Arnaldur Indrason, Asa Larsson, Kjell Erickson, Henning Mankell, Karin Fossum, the list just goes on and on. 

So, if you're in the mood to try something different, give one of these guys a try, or just browse around and pick up something you've never heard of. It's always a gamble, but I find that I like it more often than not!