Some kind Of Peace by Camilla Grebe & Åsa Träff

Author: Camilla Grebe & Åsa Träff

Title: Some Kind Of Peace

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Published: 2012

Pages: 432

Genre: Thriller 

     Meet Siri Bergman. She lives alone, an hour outside of Stockholm where she practices as a psychotherapist, her nearest neighbor far away. She is terrified of the dark. Siri tells herself that she has moved on since her husband died in a diving accident. But when she goes to bed at night, she leaves all the lights on, unable to shake the feeling that someone is watching her. What if she has good reason to be afraid?  One night she wakes to find that the house is pitch black, and the torch by her bedside has vanished. Later the body of one of her young patients is found floating in the water nearby. Thrown headlong into a tense murder investigation, everything Siri believed is called into question. Can she trust anyone?

     With the night starting to draw in and the weather on the turn, I thought it might just be time to return to my beloved Scandinavian noir. For me at least I can't bring myself to dive into such books when the sun is blazing and the days are long and lazy. But even as I write this now the air is full of fog and that slight nip has returned to the early mornings. So just maybe it's time to head a little north and find those chilling thrillers that have sat on the back burner for the past few months. Now Some Kind Of Peace has been sat on my device waiting to be read for far too long. And whilst I could have gone with a series I'm far more familiar with or another broken-down male lead. I fancied something a little more different this time around. And in rooting this one out I think I have managed to do just that. It's time to swap out the busy detective's desk for that of the psychotherapist's chair and see what monsters lurk in the dark.

     So this was my first time meeting Siri Bergman, a character that is both complex and troubled but also someone you feel a connection to. Maye that is the thing about these broken characters as observes to their lives we feel this need to protect our heroes. All the while knowing there is nothing we can possibly do to help them. Much like her fellow bedmates in this genre on the outside, they seem to be fully working people. To colleges and those they meet they can do their jobs above and beyond. But on the inside, they are torn apart by the deeds of the past. But then again maybe we are all a little like that and what we witness is a small part of ourselves reflected back. Anyway, Siri for me holds her own in this literary world. We delve into and become part of her paranoia as she starts to suspect everyone around her of these crimes. But it is not like there is any give here. she wants to get to the bottom of this mystery even if that means having to face her deep-seated fears. She becomes someone you are comfortable spending time with. Whilst some heroes feel jarring and at times their actions are so counter-intuitive that we are pulled from their fictitious worlds. Siri feels natural and very human for a person made entirely of words. We are encased in her mindset and treated to a solid thriller on the page. 

      I think at times it must be a struggle to co-authors a work of fiction. Both must have their own view as to how the story should twist and turn. But here we have an example of siblings writing together, That in its self must add a whole other level to the writing process. What we are given in Some Kind Of Peace is a well-balanced and skillfully nuanced work of crime fiction. These two clearly work well together and we are treated to yes some of the more familiar aspects of the genre. But also you can see their own combined voices coming through. It is within these more subtle movements that the book finds its own for me. Whereas some of their counterparts tend to go for the heavy-footed male anger and aggression. Here we are treated to a more claustrophobic and personal affair. These two draw us into the world they have created and we are caught at their mercy. They have demonstrated a great knack to have us feel exactly what their hero is going through. You can feel that element of distrust slowly creeping up into the dark recesses of your brain as you are trying to pick apart the clues and workout just what is taking place to Siri. 

     I feel this was just the right sort of book I was looking for at the moment. Whilst it does retain those dark and sometimes more gritty aspects of the genre. I wasn't left feeling weight down by the story I had just read. For me, it was an enjoyable who done it that I could play a little detective myself. The authors give us every opportunity to suspect and cross off or not everyone Siri comes across. I like these sorts of books where I can stretch my brain a little in trying to work out the killer. Overall, I was left very impressed by these two. It was a book that I could sink my teeth into and spend some enjoyable hours with.