The Boy in the Suitcase by Lene Kaaberbøl and Agnete Friis
Nina Borg Mysteries, Book 1
Publisher: Soho Crime (November 2011)
321 pages, eBook (purchased myself for $1.99)
Book Rating: 4 Stars
Content Note: Includes Swearing, Violence, and Sexual Situations
After an unexpected phone call from an estranged friend who asks for a strange favor then promptly makes herself scarce without giving any further details, Nina finds herself retrieving a suitcase from a storage locker, only to find it contains an unconscious child. Nina has no idea how the child came to be there or what she is supposed to do with him, but it is clear that they are both in grave danger and she is the only chance the boy has. I assumed, given this is a mystery, that the main character, Nina, would be an investigator or amateur sleuth of some sort, but in fact, she is more unwittingly involved and strung along while others, mainly the boy's mother, do all the investigating and uncovering the truth of what has set all these events in motion, while Nina basically babysits the boy, tries to avoid capture, and reflects on her dysfunctional marriage to her eternally suffering husband. While her idiosyncrasies and neuroses, made her interesting to follow, she was a little too cold and detached to be endearing and I was much more drawn to the boy's mother, Sigita, so it was fortunate that much of the story was from her point of view, as she struggled to put the pieces together and find her missing boy. Great mystery, with so many different people involved, and for much of the story you don't know just exactly how everyone fits into things, but slowly everything is revealed and it becomes clear how a young boy ended up unconscious in a suitcase and stuffed in a storage locker. Great read!
