Part of Department Q, book 3
First published 2009
A small green bottle has gathered dust for years in the window of a police station in Wick, Scotland. Nobody notices it or the letter trapped inside with its faded plea for help. When Detective Superintendent Carl Mørck receives the old message in a bottle, he assumes the barely readable cry for help came from a childhood prank. But as Carl and his assistant Assad decode more of the letter, they realize two older boys were kidnapped sometime in the 1990s. The bottle contains the only sign of life anyone has received from them since. Carl and Assad face troubling questions. Who were these boys? Why did their parents never report them missing? What happened to them after they sent their desperate message? The detectives find themselves drawn deeper into the web of a calculating and emotionless kidnapper. Time runs short when they discover the kidnapper remains active after all these years. The nightmare continues without end.
Genres: mystery, crime, thriller, detective
Vibes: dark, fast-paced, suspenseful
Tropes: cold-case, detective-story, missing-persons
Setting: Wick, Scotland
Period: 1990s
485 pages · Unbound · Politiken
Content warnings: kidnapping