'The Forbidden Place' is Susanne Jansson's debut novel, and it's an intriguing one at that! The premise is highly original and had me excited to get started reading. The setting is the most prominent character is this novel, the village of Mossmarken, in the remote Swedish wetlands is is one of the most interesting things about this deeply atmospheric mystery. Being a lover of Scandi-Noir, I was instantly drawn to this as a result. I appreciated the use of mythology to deepen the mystery and create a supernatural element, adding further interest to the tale.

Nathalie, a biologist, has returned to the village of Mossmarken, where she spent her formative years, in order to study the peat bogs for her university dissertation and knows all too well the terrible events which occurred when she was growing up in the area. Soon bodies start showing up around the mire, with the superstitious locals claiming it's the bog calling out for sacrifices. Non-believers inversely claim that it's evil in human form that is responsible for the deaths.

A chilling setting, a community with a multitude of buried secrets and discussion of philosophical principles make this an unmissable tale. Being a mental health campaigner, the fact that MH was put front and centre in the story meant a lot to me. The descriptions were so vivid that I felt transported to the eerie locations and was completely immersed in a story so intensely compelling that I raced through it. I can see why some people had issues with the way it was written. Jansson's prose is highly descriptive and may feel as though the book rarely moves forward or does so in a pedestrian fashion. If you aren't a fan of this writing style, this is most likely not for you. Being an admirer of Haruki Murakami, who writes in exactly the same style, this suited me to a t. I look forward to picking up more of her work.

Many thanks to Mulholland Books for an ARC. I was not required to post a review, and all thoughts and opinions expressed are my own.

Being a Scandinavian author I was expecting a dark, slow-paced story and bad weather. The first two were correct although the weather was 'better' than in other such novels. The story line is very good although it seemed to take such a long time to unravel and with lots of descriptions that I did not feel necessary for the story. The ending has a Poirot feel with all characters congregated in the same room for the truth to be revealed. You do not really know whether the deaths are human or ghost sourced. However I did think the last paragraph of the Epilogue did not add any value to the story. Parts of the book were very good but I found myself speed reading through pages to move the story on.

3.5 stars rounded up to 4. In the remote Swedish wetlands lies Mossmarkens: the village on the edge of the mire where, once upon a time, people came to leave offerings to the gods. Biologist Natalie came to study the peat bogs. But she has a secret: Mossmarken,was once her home, a place where terrible things happened. She has returned at last, determined to confront her childhood trauma and find out the truth.

Natalie is doing field experiments for her Doctoral thesis on Wetlands, but this is not the only reason Natalie is there, Natalie used to live there. She discovers an old friend, Johannes, there. He's been badly beaten and had been weighted down with coins. The police think he was an intended sacrifice. Superstitions have developed about the bog. Sacrifices have been made and spirits live and haunt there. But who is to blame for the people that are disappearing?

I would say that this book, in my opinion, is more thriller than horror, though it does have some creepy moments. The plot has a slow pace that then allows the tension to build. There is also a lot of twist and turns. Natalie's story, we slowly learn, she has repressed for fourteen years, but gradually her memories are coming back. Another book where to say more would be spoiling the story for everyone else. I did enjoy this book.

I would like to thank NetGalley, Hodder & Stoughton and the author Susanne Jansson for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Hodder and Stoughton for inviting me to read an advance copy of The Forbidden Place, a stand alone novel set in North Western Sweden.

Nathalie Ström returns to Mossmarken after 14 years to do biological research in the peat bog. It is in the bog that she finds her friend Johannes who has been badly beaten and weighed down with coins. She doesn't know what to think but the police come to believe that he may have been an intended sacrifice.

I enjoyed The Forbidden Place although I found it to be a bit of a mixed bag. The actual plot, i.e. the hunt for Johannes's attacker and Nathalie's search for closure on the events that drove her 12 year old self as far from Mossmarken as she could get are compelling reading and I couldn't read fast enough to get to the solution. Unfortunately I had to read through a lot of extraneous detail to get there. Initially it is biological detail about bogs, gases, collection etc which went over my head and if hadn't been for the fact that Johannes was attacked in the prologue and I wanted to know how it came about I would have given up on the novel early on. The novel alternates between Nathalie's perspective and that Maya Linde, a famous photographer who also works part time as a crime scene photographer. Once she gets involved there are too many discussions on the meaning of life, art etc. (yawn). Some may find it interesting but I'm not literary enough to be interested in it in crime fiction. The shifting perspective is quite annoying - just as a scene gets going the perspective shifts.

As I said the crime element to the novel is compelling. It starts with the attack on Johannes and broadens out gradually to a much wider investigation with its roots in the past. This dovetails nicely with Nathalie's vague investigation into her past. It is well done and all fits together seamlessly as the novel progresses.

Nathalie's story is teased out gradually over the course of the novel as she starts to talk about the events she has studiously repressed for 14 years and gradually memories come back. It's difficult to discuss without spoilers so suffice to say I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I have swithered long and hard about my rating for this novel because there are plenty of passages I either skim read or ignored completely and got frustrated with the ever changing point of view but because I really enjoyed the plot and its execution and the atmospheric location I have plumped for 4*.

Clever book that blurs supernatural with natural life. Didn’t expect the ending but well written and I doubted nearly every character in being the murderer(s) and even the spirits.

I'm unsure what to make of this book. There are some elements that work well for instance the use of the mythology of the past weaving with the narrative of the present, however the pace of the book is quite slow an there is no empathy with the characters for me. The stilted feel can at times get in the way and having enjoyed a wide range of Scandi-fiction before this was a slight disappointment. It is worth trying if you enjoy a real slow burner but it takes so long to get going you do really wonder if its worth it. I'm giving it 3 stars as there are features that work well but.....

#TheForbiddenPlace #NetGalley

I loved this fantastic piece of Scandi-Noir far more than I expected to, I have grown to be a little weary of the over top blood fests that often characterise this genre and this novel made a welcome change. This is a deeply atmospheric mystery set in the village of Mossmarken, in the ancient desolate, remote wetlands of Sweden, subject to constant dripping drizzles, storms, mists and veils of fogs. It is an area rich in superstitions, legends and mythology, where people disappear, never to be seen again, where the bogs demand their sacrifices for locals to stay safe. An Iron Age girl, Lingonberry Girl, found in the bogs in now displayed in a museum. Biologist Nathalie Strom arrives from Gothenburg, renting a cabin in the grounds of Quagmire Manor, looking to finish her doctoral dissertation on 'How the Greenhouse Effect Influences the Process of Decomposition in the Wetlands' with her final experiments.

Nathalie is no stranger to the area, she grew up there until she was 12 years old when a tragic set of events blew her world apart. Those events have made denial and repression her drugs of choice, determining her career choices where science and experiments, processes and sequences, induce a strong sense of calm in her, all under her rigorous control, as opposed to the incomprehensibilities of what happened to her when she was a child. Against her better judgement, she lets Johannes, an art student, help with her experiments, letting her barriers down as she gets personally involved with him. One day, she finds him in the hostile bogs after being seriously attacked, with his life hanging by a thread, his pockets weighed down by coins and in a coma. Nathalie finds a dug out peat grave near to where she found Johannes. Detective Leif Berggen, and Maya, artist and police photographer, look for the grave but it has disappeared into thin air. But then the ancient boglands begin to give up their bodies of the recent dead and Nathalie's painful and haunting memories begin to return.

Jannson has written a beautifully compelling and gripping mystery, with a location that serves as a central character in its own right, exerting its own sense of all encompassing chilling menace, a terrifying boglands and a local community with their buried secrets. The photographer, Maya, adds philosophical undertones to the story, and both she and Nathalie have the remarkable ability of becoming at one with the landscape and communing with it. The issues of mental health in the face of heartbreaking tragedies faced by the local community are central to this novel. I found myself completely immersed in the story, finding it intensely gripping and the fascinating wetlands location just drew me in as if I was there, so vibrant were the descriptions. A brilliant read that I recommend highly, especially for those who love their Scandi-Noir. Many thanks to Hodder and Stoughton for an ARC.

Darkly atmospheric murder mystery spanning fourteen years that grabs your interest from the very start and then you're hooked.

This thriller is set in the Swedish wetlands, where Nathalie comes to study the peat bogs. However, this is Nathalie's home and the horrid incidents that had happened here. She has come home to find peace maybe. An answer to her questions and fears.

would like to thank netgalley and the publisher for letting me read this book

where to start....marshlands and dead bodies turning up after several decades missing...it all should be a good read...but i found it very hard to maintain interest...so much detail on the mundane things that i lost the plot several times....

but the marshlands and the weather all made for a visionary delight...even if there was to much detail within the rest of the story, sorry i just couldnt maintain the interest

Unfortunately I did not feel that The Forbidden Place lived up to its blurb and promise with the story being very slow and exceptionally difficult to engage with.

Not for me

This was very slow to get going and the scientific descriptions and spooky folklore were boring as well as being irrelevent, for this in the end was just a murder mystery. It had disconcerting changes in scene, sometines without changing paragraph or even in the middle of a line - maybe this was just in the proof copy. The characters were not memorable and the setting sounded very dreary. Would you want to stay at Quagmire Manor?!

The descriptions of the bog and life in the woodlands were good. But this book failed to live up to expectations: it was slow to get going and was, at times, bogged down in philosophical discussions about the meaning of life. This did not impress me. Natalie was not a character I could empathise with. The other worldly aspect ultimately came to nothing. I would not recommend any of my friends to read this book.

In this ethereal crime mystery with a brooding sense of unease, ‘The Forbidden Place’ is where past practices keep unsettling pace with the present.

Moderately eerie passages capture the devouring nature of the peat bog and the sinister ancient rites that accompany it. And although the narration can feel a little disjointed in places, this mirrors the main character’s thoughts as she processes the tragedy she has encountered.

Once I’d settled in to the flow I could appreciate the effectiveness of this simplistic method of telling. It delicately fed the bog’s foreboding presence to influence those living within a stone’s throw of its watery edge.

I enjoyed the progression within the plot and the rate this developed. It was a relatively quick and painless read with an interesting stage.

I AM usually a great fan of Swedish crime thrillers but not this one. It is a very slow burner that never really gets started until halfway through the book. It did not live up the blurb trying to sell the book to me.
Not one for me.

Authors from Nordic countries are very good at writing dark, atmospheric books. Susanne Jansson also write nightmares. I can attest to that. Reading this book in bed is not advisable.

Why do creepy huts never have curtains? Why do people always go exploring scary forests and marshlands an hour before dark? How dis Ms Jansson come up with such a multi-faceted, twisting storyline?

I enjoyed reading this book but, even though it is not gory or horrific, it stepped one foot over my too scary line.

I really struggled with this book and I don't know whether this is because of the author's style of writing, or, that it's been translated. Either way, it was hard to read and engage with in anyway.

The premise is a good one, that of the Swedish wetlands and a body found in mysterious circumstances. However, I couldn't connect with the story or the characters and found the ending a disappointment.

2*

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to preview.

A good read. This is a dark story about superstition and beliefs. This is an easy read. There is atmosphere and well described characters. It is definitely worth reading.

Thank you to Netgalley for my copy.

A lovely thrilling read!

I was very eager to get started on this book and it did not disappoint! The story flowed well in my opinions and it was full off tense moments. Can recommend!

A moody, atmospheric novel that's enough to give you the chills. A descriptive writing style which makes the book flow beautifully from tha beginning. The story weaves historical traditions and superstition with modern crimes and science, seamlessly and with great flair. The characters are interesting, engaging and well thought out. There is plenty of mystery and enough twists to keep you guessing almost to the end. A gripping read with a satisfying conclusion. A wonderful book that I could happily read again and again