The 13th book in the Inspector Konrad Sejer series is as well written as ever to ensure that followers of the series will devour it and new readers will be able to enjoy it, without reading any of the previous books. Fossum writes complex tales with such brevity you are easily lost in the pages.

Hmmmmm mixed review to be honest, I like my novels fast paced and full of twists and turns and I’m afraid this wasn’t either.

Not a bad read but rather gloomy and suffocating reading about Ragnas life, I did get through it but it wasn’t my cup of tea though I did enjoy the relationship Ragna had with the inspector and how that built up through the interviews.

Ragna can't speak, only whisper. Being a bit self conscious about it, she retreats into herself, and follows a safe, cautious routine in life. Then she starts getting threatening letters..... soon nothing is as it seems, and I just loved the book!!!! It was so well written, I couldn't wait to finish it and just see how it all ends up!
Highly recommended.

Very long winded and left me feeling quite miserable. Seemed to lose its way and just never grabbed me again.

I love this series, I think I have missed a few but it was easy to pick up. I love the slow burn and pace and Sejer is one of my favourite detectives. Fossum really writes like no one else I think of. I really enjoyed it and will be reading the one's I have missed.

Ragna Riegel, having lost her voice in a botched throat operation, is known as the whisperer. The story unfolds through her interrogation in prison, while being held on remand before her trial.
She seeks to explain her actions to Inspector Sejer by recounting her life and everything that led up to what we are told was a dreadful crime. She portrays herself as a helpless victim of circumstances throughout, abandoned by her only son and without a voice. Yet everything is told from her viewpoint, and it is only as her son corresponds with her in prison towards the end of the book, and when the Inspector reveals various independent facts that we get a different perspective on events.
This was an absorbing psychological study of a damaged personality and of mental illness. The story progresses slowly and we do not get details of the crime committed until almost at the end. The emphasis was less on who done it, but rather on why it was done. Ragna was a complex character and it was not always easy to establish who were the real victims in this sad story, but I loved the masterly twist at the end.
I would like to thank NetGalley, the publishers and author for providing a free advance copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

Very wordy story that progressed very slowly. Although it seemed quite interesting at the beginning was too far drawn out and became boring. Not my kind of story

You can rely on Karin Fossum to never write a normal crime novel. And this is a very long way from being normal, even for a genre as diverse and unconventional as Scandi crime. The Whisperer does feature Fossum’s long-standing investigator, Inspector Sejer, but that’s about the only thing this story has in common with a typical police procedural. It’s not so much about the anatomy of a crime but an exploration of the psychopathy of a criminal – and what a sadly bedraggled, fragile and fragmented character she is.

I’m deliberately steering clear of almost all the major plotpoints in this review, to avoid compromising your reading experience. This is one of those books where it’s best that you encounter it fresh; where you have the chance to form your own opinions. The narrator is extremely unreliable but her perspective is pitifully convincing. It’s a magnificent construction of urban isolation; of melancholic paranoia, of abandonment and insecurity.

Fossum weaves these themes into the skein of everyday life. While most crime / thrillers take place in a fictional world which closely resembles our own – but which has its own dramatic conventions – the events of The Whisperer could be taken directly from our daily experience. Who sees the frightened woman who always sits in the same place on the bus every day? Who has time for the shop assistant who looks a bit bedraggled? Who bothers to ask if a neighbour is OK when she stumbles around the freezing streets wearing only slippers on her feet?

This means that much of the scene-setting segments in the earlier part of the story have a ‘so what?’ feel to them. But gradually the narrative moves past the miserable mundanity of a grim existence and we start to understand why the protagonist is in police custody, why Sejer is taking so long to question her so carefully. And we start to wonder about exactly what occurred in these banal little incidents, the ones which should be trivial but which take on an appalling importance as the story unfolds.

Slow burn? Definitely.

Page-turning thrill-a-minute? Definitely not.

This is a book for readers with patience and perception. My attention meandered a little in the opening chapters but gradually succumbed to the insidious lure of the inevitable – and to Fossum’s immense skill in constructing such solidly realised characters who endure such desperate situations. Spend too long immersed in this story and you too might start to feel uncertain and a little unsettled – and totally unprepared for the surprises in store.

Original, unpredictable and completely convincing, this is crime fiction for true connoisseurs.

9/10

The Whisperer is a depressing read, while I can't put my finger on what went wrong with this book it just didn't grip me in the same way that other recent thrillers have. If you've read everything else on your shelf then I'd recommend it.

Karin Fossum shows her excellence as a writer in this novel entirely centred on an serious crime interview between Ragnia Regel and Inspector Sejer. His sensitive interrogation - more of an extended chat really -gradually draws out a story from the ultra introverted Ragnia. The novel's title comes from the fact Ragnia can only emit the faintest whisper due to a faulty operation many years previously and this gives this drama an extraordinary intimacy. Ragnia lives alone, follows a vary strict routine and never has visitors until one day she lets a Jehovah's witness into her home. Once she opens up about this visit Sejer finds his interview taking him into areas that leave him deeply saddened - as are we all. But this is a Norwegian tale definitely worth reading as Ragnia's life also has moments of simple joy to lighten the ever-present Scandanavian gloom.

This book is three quarters of the way through before the story is revealed. Up to then it is a jumble of facts about a damaged woman. It jumps in time continuously. When the gist of the story is eventually revealed it remains as pointless as at the start.

I really enjoyed this book. The story is well written and well thought out. Ragna is a fascinating character. I thought she was described well and in an interesting way. The story is revealed a piece at a time and that added to my enjoyment of it.

Thank you to Netgalley for my copy.

Set in a fictional town in Norway, Kirkelina is not somewhere I would want to go. It's the most depressing town I've read about in a long while.

The Whisperer is the latest installment in the Inspector sejer series but although Ihave read only a few (slapped wrists) this one seemed slower and more inward looking. I did feel a bit sad and depressed reading it as there was a lot inside Ragna's head. A very slow start but the outcome and twist in her getting that letter was a nice denouement. I had problems with the feel of the novel and the darkness (though this is not the darkest novel I have read - not by far!)

I would recommend the other Fossum books but this was a miss for me I'm afraid.

Karin Fossum is a unique crime fiction writer and one of my personal favorite Scandinavian author. She Is known for her exceptional character outlines and her simple, nevertheless effective, prose which create a sui generis atmosphere in all her novels''The Whisperer'' is the latest installment in Fossum's Konrad Sejer series and, in my opinion, is one of the best as it combines the trademark characteristics of the author and a suspensful plotline, making it impossible to stop reading until you can see the whole picture and the plot is totally resolved. The protagonist, Ragna Riegel, is a timid, mousy, middle-aged woman who lives in the small town of Kirkelina in Norway.and works in a local super-market. Due to an unfortunate medical error during a surgery, her vocal cords are permanently damaged, so she can only whisper. The story is narrated in the present, where Ragna is interrogated by Inspector Sejer for a crime that the reader ignores and the past where the long series of events that led to Ragna's arrest are recounted. Fossum is an experienced author who knows how to keep the suspense alive throughout the book, based solely in dialogue and description and without any action parts. ''The Whisperer'' is, above all, a remarkable psychogram of the protagonist, Ragna, an ordinary woman who ends up comimiting a terrible crime and her emotional journey that is set off by a series of threatening letters that she begins to receive in her mailbox. Furthermore, the reader who is not familiar with the character of Konrad Sejer will have the opportunity to become acquainted with the solemn, thoughtful, grey-eyed Inspector and his relationship with his late wife, Elise. One shouldn't expect a typical Nordic Noir crime/thriller, fast- paced and packed with action sequences. This is a novel for those who like to devour a novel in a slow rhythm and absorb its imagery. The interrogation parts offer an example of great dialogue and in many cases i had to stop reading in order to keep notes. Overall, ''The Whisperer'' was a novel worth waiting and is one of the writer's finest works to date.
I want to thank NetGalley and the publisher for providing a free ARC of this book.

The Whisperer, the thirteenth in the Inspector Konrad Sejer series, is a polarising crime novel which you'll either love or hate. This is because it is much more of a character study of loner Ragna Riegel than a book propelled by action. She is suspected of committing a crime and most of this story surrounds Inspector Sejer's attempts to understand her reasoning, so if you're looking for fast-paced, plot-driven crime fiction then you have come to the wrong place. Part of the reason Fossum is known as the Queen of Norwegian Crime is due to her originality, intelligent and nuanced plots and in-depth look at a characters motivation for committing a crime.

As always, the writing is scalpel sharp and the interview structure actually works like a charm here. As this is not a conventional or hard-boiled crime novel I recommend this more to those who enjoy psychological thrillers or those who appreciate character analysis, and I can't help but feel as though it would be a lot more successful as a novella rather than the full-length book that it is. The author masterfully and slowly ratchets up the tension and lets the story unravel over the whole book, and the reader really gets to know Ragna as well as Mr Sejer - with his quiet, thoughtful demeanour. This in effect is a whydunnit as opposed to a whodunnit, and it's one of Fossum's best novels to date.

Many thanks to Harvill Secker for an ARC.

Ragna Riegel works at Europris (a supermarket) and lives alone in her childhood home. Her parents are dead and her only son has moved to Berlin. The only contact they have is the occasional Christmas and birthday cards. Ragna likes a routine. She sit on the same seat every day and buys the same items at the local shops. Then one day her routine is shattered. She receives a letter. It contains a threat by a unknown enemy. Ragna realises she must use all means possible to defend herself.

I have not read any of Karin Fossum's books before and I did not realise that this was book 13 in the series. It definitely can be read as a standalone. The story is set in the small town of Kirkelina in Norway. Ragna has has an operation on her throat that left her with damaged vocal chords. Anonymous letters that Ragna has received have upset her daily routine. Inspector Sejer is compassionate Ragna and her fears. The pace of this well written book is slow, but that works well for this story.it has quite an emotional ending.

I would like to thank NetGalley, Random House UK, Vintage Publishing and the author Karin Fussom for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I'm in two minds about this book, I really liked parts of it and didn't like others. I couldn't feel any sympathy for Ragna as her character felt unreal to me. The police investigation part was the best part of the story I found.

Well, first got to say I had no idea this was book 29, yep 29 in The Inspector Sejer series, it reads 100% as a stand alone, well imo.
Secondly the main character Ragna Riegel,as she was Norwegian reminded me of a friend,so unbeknown to them they played the main part in the ‘film’ that accompanies your imagination when you read! 😃
Karin Fossum is billed as the ‘Queen of Norwegian Crime Writing’ and I have to confess to not knowingly ever read a Norwegian author before ( nor do I watch any of the brooding dramas on Ch4 from Norway/Scandi ) strange really as Copenhagen is my fav city in the world followed by Oslo but anyway I digress....
Obvs the names, towns etc are in Norwegian as are the police procedural parts and the descriptions of prison etc, I found this fascinating as was the general description of Norwegian life and customs, also the shop where Ragna worked was wonderfully described and made me want to go there and browse the different goods on offer ( in comparision to UK shops)
I also found the odd political statement on the refugee status in Norway interesting, from both viewpoints ( one character is a Turkish shop owner who features on and off )
Ragna can only whisper after a botched op and this is delved into quite a lot in the book and you really feel for her and the problems and trials it brings every day
The story itself is dark( ish ) but not inky dark, there is enough heart and soul in it to not just be classed as a dark thriller, the writing is deliberate and detailed (on occasion repeated, even laboured a few times) and gives you a rare insight into a troubled and very active mind, what could be mundane is described with such clarity it becomes intense
Ragna receives nasty threats in her letterbox and is being followed, but why and by who?
I can almost here you sigh and say not again!!, but thats where the similarity with other books ends....and I am not giving any spoilers other than to say its dramatic and changeable!! and the ending was very emotional for Ragna and I think for the reader!, then the last few sentences changed the game again!!!
Inspector Serjer is a joy and the interactions between him and various characters inc Rega brilliantly described
A really unusual book, that I may have overlooked and thought nah not for me but really glad I gave it a chance as was a stimulating read

When we first meet Ragna we can't understand what's going on. She's talking to Inspector Konrad Sejer and it's obvious that she's being held in custody because of a crime which she admits she's committed. Only, as we hear about Greta's life it seems that she's more sinned against than sinning. After a botched operation on her vocal chords she can't speak above a whisper and to add insult to injury she's been left with a horrible scar across her throat. She's done her best to make a go of her life though: she enjoys her work in a shop and has learned ways of coping with the difficulties of communicating with people.

Her life began to take a turn for the worse when she began to receive anonymous threatening letters. They turn up at irregular intervals in her mailbox, addressed just to 'Riegel'. Her immediate reaction was to burn them or throw them in the rubbish: she had no immediate thought of taking them to the police. Ragna was determined that she was not going to be beaten. It would have helped if she'd had someone to talk to, but she lived on her own. Her parents were dead and her son had moved to Berlin. He sent cards at Christmas and on her birthday but that was the extent of their communication. He was a source of pride for her - she'd tell her fellow workers about his responsible job as a director of a big Berlin hotel. That didn't solve her immediate problem though.

As we read, Sejer teases out the facts of Ragna's life and what happened in the prelude to the serious crime which we know she committed although we don't know what it was. In fact we're a long way into the book before we know what happened. The Whisperer is an unusual police procedural: Sejer is there, but not the rest of the team which we know so well. We hear what Ragna and Sejer say to each other and we have flashbacks to Ragna's life before the crime. Initially I was rather disappointed by this: I like the cut and thrust of an investigation and the surprise of finding out the perpetrator. I found too that there was more telling than showing, but I found myself strangely drawn into the story, convinced that I knew the outcome.

There is, though, quite a startling twist at the end, which blew me away and completely changed my view of what had happened - and then there's another. It's a book with a slow burn, but it's worth persevering for the pleasure of such a well imagined and constructed ending. I'd like to thank the publishers for making a copy available to the Bookbag.

I would like to thank Netgalley and Random House UK, Vintage Publishing for an advance copy of The Whisperer, the thirteenth novel to feature Inspector Sejer.

Ragna Riegel is a lonely woman working a dead end job and mourning the lack of communication with her only son, Rikard Josef, who lives and works in Berlin but Ragna has committed a crime and the novel consists of her interviews with Sejer as he attempts to understand the events leading up to it.

I found The Whisperer to be a bit of a mixed bag as character analysis does not interest me as much as crime solving. At first I found myself turning the pages rapidly to find out what Ragna had done but as this is not revealed until three quarters of the way into the novel I found my interest flagging. It is obvious that there is something not quite right about Ragna, on the spectrum is my guess, and I found it a bit tiresome at times. The novel, however, redeems itself in the final quarter with reveal after reveal and a masterful irony at the very end.

The novel revolves around Ragna and her experiences. A botched operation has left her unable to speak well so she is the eponymous Whisperer. I assume that this is a metaphor for her self effacing life, she is a whisper of a person but I’m not smart enough to see further. A series of anonymous letters has upset her routine and she doesn’t handle it well so the novel charts her slow disintegration. I like the way Ms Fossum plays with the reader’s perception but Ragna is so dreary it can be a chore. I think the novel would have been sharper as a novella.

I enjoyed the style with the sharp writing and the interview style allowing the narrative to slip back in time while still keeping it firmly anchored in the present. It works well.

The Whisperer is not really my kind of novel but I think that any reader who enjoys a character driven novel will thoroughly enjoy it. 3.5*