Fatal Gambit
By the author of THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER'S WEB
Published on 25. September 2025
Book
Paperback/Softback
352 pages
978-1-5294-1326-7 (ISBN)
Description
Claire Lidman died fourteen years ago.
So why does she appear in the background of a recent holiday snap taken in Venice?
Her husband brings the anomaly to Hans Rekke and Micaela Vargas. Initial scepticism gives way to cautious belief, but Rekke is falling apart again and Vargas has her own problems. Her gangster brother is threatening to silence her if she doesn't get off his case.
Meanwhile, Rekke's daughter Julia has a new boyfriend she's determined to keep secret. He sees something in her she can't see herself, but there are hints of a darker side.
Most troubling of all, Rekke is hearing whispers of a name he hasn't heard for years. A rival from his youth whose restless evil links all the threads in this incipient case. The pieces are laid and he's already one move ahead. The name of the game is revenge.
Translated from the Swedish by Ian Giles
Reviews for Dark Music:
"One Holmes himself would have loved to solve" Independent
"A rich, engrossing novel" Literary Review
"A complex and dark Sherlock Holmesian tale" Irish Independent
So why does she appear in the background of a recent holiday snap taken in Venice?
Her husband brings the anomaly to Hans Rekke and Micaela Vargas. Initial scepticism gives way to cautious belief, but Rekke is falling apart again and Vargas has her own problems. Her gangster brother is threatening to silence her if she doesn't get off his case.
Meanwhile, Rekke's daughter Julia has a new boyfriend she's determined to keep secret. He sees something in her she can't see herself, but there are hints of a darker side.
Most troubling of all, Rekke is hearing whispers of a name he hasn't heard for years. A rival from his youth whose restless evil links all the threads in this incipient case. The pieces are laid and he's already one move ahead. The name of the game is revenge.
Translated from the Swedish by Ian Giles
Reviews for Dark Music:
"One Holmes himself would have loved to solve" Independent
"A rich, engrossing novel" Literary Review
"A complex and dark Sherlock Holmesian tale" Irish Independent
Reviews / Votes
Excellent . . . Part of the fun is Lagercrantz's deliberate use of Holmesian tropes -there's a Moriarty-like criminal mastermind, and Vargas and Rekke echo Holmes and Watson in more ways than one - but he departs from Conan Doyle's template with a complex, borderline-baroque mystery plot, to thrilling effect. By the end of the pulse-pounding denouement, readers will be breathless for the next installment * Publishers Weekly *More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Quercus Publishing
Product notice
Paperback (UK-B)
Dimensions
Height: 195 mm
Width: 128 mm
Thickness: 29 mm
Weight
250 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-5294-1326-7 (9781529413267)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
08/2024
MacLehose Press
€2.99
Available for download
Person
David Lagercrantz was born in 1962, and is an acclaimed author and journalist. In 2015 The Girl in the Spider's Web (2015), his continuation of Stieg Larsson's Millennium Trilogy, became a worldwide bestseller and was made into a film by Sony Pictures (2018). He is the author of the acclaimed and bestselling I am Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Fall of Man in Wilmslow, and the fifth and sixth books in the Millennium series, The Girl Who Takes an Eye for an Eye (2017) and The Girl Who Lived Twice (2019). Dark Music, the first Rekke and Vargas Investigation, will be published in the UK in 2022.