The Hanging Girl by Jussi Adler-Olsen

First published in Denmark in 2014; published in translation by Dutton on September 8, 2015

The Hanging Girl is tied with the first Department Q novel as my favorite entry (so far) in this excellent series. The mystery is complex but credible. The story builds suspense but doesn’t skimp on character development. Humor and drama are carefully balanced. The book is long but it never moves slowly and it ends in a burst of excitement.

A police sergeant on an outlying island finally gives up on a case he could never solve, but not without asking Department Q for help. Carl wants nothing to do with it. As usual, Rose bullies him into investigating the case, an unsolved hit-and-run that left a young girl’s body hanging from the tree branches in which it was entangled.

When Carl, Rose, and Assad look into the old case and a more recent death, Carl sees nothing worth investigating and wants to go home. As is the custom in these books, Carl is outvoted by his subordinates and the subsequent investigation leads to a deepening mystery.

As that investigation progresses, alternating chapters fill us in on a story of several missing women and of rivalries for the attention of Atu, a charismatic fellow who worships the sun. Another woman, not yet missing, is at risk.

An ongoing storyline in these novels concerns an incident in which Carl and his colleague Hardy were shot. Carl blames his cowardice for the fact that Hardy was left paralyzed. That subplot is advanced a bit in The Hanging Girl, more than it has been in recent novels. Jussi Adler-Olsen seems to be setting up a significant development in that subplot in an upcoming novel.

Also advancing is the evolving mystery of Assad’s background. Assad is my favorite character in the series, an outwardly gentle and decent man (most of the time) who clearly has a violent history. Each novel teases the reader with hits of Assad’s past, but it is the Assad of the present who plays a heroic and self-sacrificing role in The Hanging Girl.

I always learn something when I read one of these novels. This one features a good bit of interesting information about the intersection of astrology, astronomy, and theology. More importantly, it features a surprising plot that continues to twist until the truth is finally revealed.

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