Martin Holmen

The final instalment in the Harry Kvist series, SLUGGER, is again, brutal, unflinching, desperate, dark, sad, demoralising, and beautiful. Just like the rest of the series, only more so.

If you're new to these 3 novels (CLINCH, DOWN FOR THE COUNT and finally SLUGGER), then this is a series that can work as a set of standalone novels, but are much better in order. Harry Kvist is, on the face of it, a violent, dark and conflicted character. Ex-boxer, standover man, out homosexual in mid 1930's Stockholm. A Stockholm where he's always inhabited a dark, poor, tricky world, one now plagued by the rise of the Facists with Nazi's openly marching in the streets, and gangsters fighting a deadly turf war.

In this world Harry Kvist maintains an odd balancing act - part of the violence and the excess, he's also capable of extreme tenderness and kindness. In this novel he's caring for his landlord, and part-time boss Lundin, the undertaker who is obviously frail and dying. Then there's his dog Dixie, whose companionship and care remains a bright point in Kvist's otherwise dismal personal life. Although in this novel he's obsessed with the idea of getting to America, to his young daughter. The story of her birth, his relationship with her mother, and their parting of ways is expanded in short, reflective moments within the general hopelessness of a life that's meandering, and struggling. The desire to get to America is tempered by his desire for justice for his friend, and former lover, Reverend Gabrielsson who has been brutally murdered, and both those desires combine when Kvist pairs up with the gangster, Ma, head of one of Stockholm's largest gangs who promises him assistance to America for his help in the gangland wars.

These novels are dark, desperate and violent. They are explicit and unflinching. And they are amongst the most beautiful things I've read in a long long time. Kvist is fascinating. He's a series of massive contradictions in a suit and hat, but ultimately he's as human as human can be. Desperate for love, affection and purpose, his regard for Lundin, his love of Dixie are bright little lights in a world that's goes to shit on a regular basis. I can't tell you how transfixed I was with their combined fates - knowing that this is the end of this wonderful trilogy. Fates that physically jolted me, that hurt.

Slow and considered, the dance of life that Kvist commenced in CLINCH, speeds up and the fates align to end in exactly the way you'd hope it wouldn't, but could not imagine to have gone any other way.

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The second in the Harry Kvist series, DOWN FOR THE COUNT follows CLINCH, with the third book, SLUGGER, now available in Australia as well. Think deepest darkest dirtiest noir, of the hardest possible bitten variety, and this series fits the definition perfectly. Add longing for love, and a touching sense of loyalty as well. Harry Kvist is an unlikely hard man, although his initial description would seem to fit the bill. He's a boxer, a brawler, a heavy and a hard man. In DOWN FOR THE COUNT he's leaving behind his latest prison sentence to return to his small flat, above the funeral directors, with his beloved dog, and hopefully his latest love. Doughboy as he refers to him, is due to be released from the same prison not long after Kvist and he's obsessed, excited, full of longing for his young lover, full of hope for their future together.

The Stockholm of 1935 that he returns to is familiar in many ways - most of the same people are still working where they were when he went into prison, many of them happy to see him return home. One of his oldest friends, however, has been murdered and Kvist thinks all is not right with the investigation into that death. At the same time the scourge of Nazism is starting to make itself felt on the streets of his hometown which makes it a dangerous place for a hard man like him, a known homosexual, an enforcer, somebody determined to get to the bottom of the death that has offended his sense of right and wrong, and sets him up against the highest echelons of Swedish society.

Whilst it's not absolutely necessary to have read the first novel - CLINCH, it will certainly help, and if you're a fan of dark, twisting and difficult tales, then it will be well worth your time. Having been absolutely blown away by that first book I was really pleased to find SLUGGER, the third, in my incoming mail a little while ago, although annoyed with myself when I discovered DOWN FOR THE COUNT had come and gone without my noticing. Harry Kvist is a fabulous character, despite the toughness and the unrelenting drive of the man, he's touching and whilst not exactly sympathetic, understandable. His world is dark, and it always feels like it's about to get a lot darker, and yet he remains loyal, in his way. Faithful, in his way. Straight up and down, in his way. Hopeful, in his own, beaten down, complicated and complex, dark and darker way.

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"Clinch" suffers from the style of its translation or perhaps it is hard to read in Swedish too. I don't know because I don't read Swedish. Henning Koch's translation credentials are good so I have no idea what is going on here.

Good English prose flows and I always thought, from listening to Swedish, that Swedish flows too. "Clinch" is about a former boxer and the sentences are short hard punches. The style, whether it arises from the original text or the translation, left me sore and weak. I could not take the punishment and tapped out.

I received a review copy of "Clinch" by Martin Holmén translated by Henning Koch (Pushkin Vertigo) through NetGalley.com.… (mehr)

Ultra-gritty describes the 1930's Stockholm that Harry Kvist occupies, as well as Kvist himself. To say nothing of the people that he mixes with. It's a beautifully evoked world of dark and despair, littered with violent sexual encounters, drinking, and oddly, an unexpected love affair of sorts.

Told from his point of view Kvist is nothing if not brutally honest about himself, his situation, even the way he looks. And as an ex-boxer he's well suited to his now role of debt-collector, and general intimidating presence. It's the role of debt collector that sees him become the prime suspect after a debtor he has just visited, and roughed up just a touch, is discovered murdered in his apartment. Kvist might be the last known person to have seen him alive, but this time he knows he's definitely not guilty. Unfortunately clearing his name isn't going to be straightforward as finding the witness that saw him leaving on the night, when he's just got is a working name and physical description to go on, isn't easy.

The plot itself is not unfamiliar - the lone wolf character, presumed guilty because that's the easiest conclusion to draw, setting out on his own to clear his name. What lifts CLINCH out of the familiar is the strength of the character of Kvist and the world that he occupies. Working the streets, the slums, the brothels and the dives of Stockholm, there's something deeply physical about the way that Kvist undertakes his quest. But then sheer physicality is the thing about Kvist - be it his hetero- and homo-sexual encounters, or the way he inhabits the darker places in which he seeks.

When Scandinavian crime / thriller fiction first elbowed itself into the consciousness of crime fiction fans it frequently bought with it something unusual at the time - introspection and consideration, the examination of why people do what they do, rather than always the crime, an investigation and resolution. CLINCH seems to come from somewhere slightly different again. Kvist feels like he'd be comfortable walking the dark, gritty streets of a dangerous American city, and equally at home on the hard edges of the Scottish and Irish tenements plagued with violence and social problems. That he's from Stockholm, and the world he inhabits is dark, cold, dirty, desperate, and frequently pretty nasty makes more sense than this reader ever imagined would be possible.

If you've read the blurb for CLINCH and formed some conclusions about style, and outcome in your mind, then it's likely you got close in some things and miles away in others. There are shades of noir in this novel so unexpected that even after reading CLINCH, this reader is still mildly stunned and absolutely thankful for the opportunity.

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