The electrifying first appearance of Jo Nesbø’s detective, Harry Hole. Inspector Harry Hole of the Oslo Crime Squad is dispatched to Sydney to observe a murder case. Harry is free to offer assistance, but he has firm instructions to stay out of trouble. The victim is a twenty-three year old Norwegian woman who is a minor celebrity back home. Never one to sit on the sidelines, Harry befriends one of the lead detectives, and one of the witnesses, as he is drawn deeper into the case. Together, they discover that this is only the latest in a string of unsolved murders, and the pattern points toward a psychopath working his way across the country. As they circle closer and closer to the killer, Harry begins to fear that no one is safe, least of all those investigating the case.

Review

“This is an absolute must for devotees of the riveting train wreck that is Harry Hole. … While the chronological confusion is disconcerting, it adds a layer of dramatic irony to the tale and enhances its tension and power.” —Booklist (starred review)“Harry is already every bit as volcanic as in his later cases. The big difference is Australia, which Nesbø, seeing it through the eyes of both a tourist and a cultural pathologist, makes you wonder how much different it is from Norway after all.” —Kirkus Reviews

«This debut effort shows Nesbø as an already confident genre craftsman, striking sparks from the familiar genre material of Harry’s fish-out-of-water experience in a foreign land and odd-couple pairing with a mismatched partner.» --Publishers Weekly

Advance praise from the U.K.“Even with this first book Nesbø’s command of the idiom is completely in place—there is absolutely no sense that the writer was finding his feet and aficionados will be very pleased to slide this on to their bookshelves alongside the other Harry Hole novels.” --The Daily Express“It is fantastic to see a younger Harry, a more loquacious Harry. . . . [Nesbø is] a terrific writer who knows how to build a story, taking you slowly to the top of a rollercoaster before sending you hurtling towards a solution that you never see coming.” --Scottish Express“Nesbø is already taking on the clichés, ruthlessly tearing them apart and coming up with new riffs. … Most satisfyingly, we can now see the organic shape that Nesbø always intended his work to take.” --The Independent (London)

About the Author

Jo Nesbø’s books have sold more than eighteen million copies worldwide, and have been translated into forty-seven languages. His Harry Hole novels include The Redbreast, Nemesis, The Devil’s Star, The Snowman, The Leopard, Phantom and The Redeemer, and he is the author of Headhunters and several children’s books. He has received the Glass Key Award for best Nordic crime novel. He is also a musician, songwriter, and economist and lives in Oslo.

The Bat: The First Inspector Harry Hole Novel