Stockholm Noir

--Ake Edwardson's short story, Stairway From Heaven, was named a finalist for the Shamus Award for Best Private Eye Short Story.

"Grouped under three headings, the 13 stories in this outstanding entry in Akashic's noir series capture the gloomy underside of Sweden's capital, portraying the hopelessness of those trapped in what Larson and Edenborg in their introduction call the city that devours your soul." --Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

"Coedited by local authors Larson and Edenborg, this superb sampling of Swedish crime writing talent, some of whose work has been translated into English for the first time here, will be appreciated by fans of Stieg Larsson's Millennium trilogy and Jens Lapidus's Easy Money; they will enjoy getting to know these authors, who write about Stockholm's dark side." --Library Journal

Akashic Books continues its award-winning series of original noir anthologies, launched in 2004 with Brooklyn Noir. Each book comprises all new stories, each one set in a distinct neighborhood or location within the respective city.

Brand-new stories by: Unni Drougge, Inger Edelfeldt, Carl-Michael Edenborg, Ake Edwardson, Torbjörn Elensky, Inger Frimansson, Carl Johan De Geer, Martin Holmén, Nathan Larson, Malte Persson, Anna-Karin Selberg, Johan Theorin, and Lina Wolff.

From the introduction by Nathan Larson & Carl-Michael Edenborg:

"To the tourist, the city of Stockholm appears a shimmering dream. Laid out on a series of islands, it is verdant, clean, and surrounded by crystalline water. On paper, Stockholm is paradise. And in some respects, it truly is. But in most respects, it is anything but . . .

"In Stockholm Noir, the city is presented as a gaping maw ready to devour your soul should you wander down the wrong alley . . . Everywhere is noir. Even, and especially, in a paradise like Sweden, where the citizen is given every tool to go out and become a great success but is paradoxically held to an almost subliminal expectation to fall in line . . . and never shine so brightly that you disturb your neighbor . . .

"In this anthology it's our aim to showcase the darker, grittier, more intense world of Swedish noir fiction. Here the dangers lurking beneath the IKEA lifestyle are given free rein, and words are given to the ambivalence and despair of a model society."