CLINCH (The Stockholm Trilogy: Volume One)
MARTIN HOLMÉN (tr. Henning Koch)
Pushkin Vertigo
$9.99 ebook, available now
Rating: 4.5* of five
The Publisher Says: Dashiell Hammett meets Raymond Chandler in this ultra-gritty piece of contemporary Swedish noir, set in a decrepit, highly atmospheric 1930s Stockholm
The writing's on the wall for Harry Kvist. Once a notorious boxer, he now spends his days drinking, and his nights chasing debts amongst the pimps, prostitutes and petty thieves of 1930s Stockholm. When women can't satisfy him, men can. But one biting winter's night he pays a threatening visit to a debtor named Zetterberg, and when the man is found dead shortly afterwards, all eyes are on Kvist.
Determined to avoid yet another stint in prison, Kvist sets out to track down the only person who can clear his name. His hunt will lead him from the city's slums, gangster hideouts and gambling dens to its most opulent hotels and elite nightclubs. It will bring him face to face with bootleggers and whores, aristocrats and murderers. It will be the biggest fight of his life.
Blending noir with gritty violence, Clinch is a visceral, compulsive thriller that packs a punch and leaves you reeling.
I RECEIVED THIS BOOK FROM THE GOODREADS M/M GIFT EXCHANGE. THANKS!
My Review: This one was a surprise to receive the year I got it. I had it on my list, and whaddaya know, in it came. I wasn't expecting to get a really dark, pretty nihilistic read but really feel glad I did.
Male bisexuality is all but invisible in all parts of our culture. No matter how much progress gets made, this is true. Gay guys are deeply suspicious of and fairly hostile to bi guys; straight women prefer their fantasy men either straight or gay, no spectrum tolerance there, either. I've never heard a lesbian express an opinion on the matter.
Harry is a rough-and-tumble guy. He's got the marks of a life in boxing on his body; he's got the marks of a beginning that leads a man into boxing on his being. He's on hard ground in his life because he's been in prison for fucking who he pleases instead of who society says to.
It's not like Sweden in the 1930s was the socialist paradise, however alloyed it may be, that it is today. Society was more aligned with the Nazi German model. Neutral Sweden provided a lot of raw materials to the Nazis and never helped the Jews...that was piecemeal, individually made decisions, not real help despite some of its diplomats doing their best. It's complicated, as what is not? Go look at Lise Meitner's experiences in Sweden, Othering was alive and well.
Harry, found guilty of sodomy, is shoved further down the social hierarchy until he arrives at loan-shark debt collector. It's here the action begins...his latest collection effort is found dead the day he comes to make good. Well, this ain't good. Harry's guaranteed to go back to prison if he gets convicted of the crime, and who the hell will make any effort to get him a fair trial rather than just pin the crime on him and go on with their day? Only Harry...so who saw him? Oh no, only a whore and a man in a snazzy sports car who tried his sexual luck with Harry. Not great choices.
Author Holmén, whose debut novel this is, creates a believably complex Harry, a pragmatic earthy survivor who loves animals and kids, helps anyone who needs it when he can (Lundin, his landlord the undertaker, is one), and satiates his needs as he experiences them however is available to him. He knows the deck is stacked against him so he doesn't hesitate to use violent means to get what he needs, to protect himself and others from predators, and even to become a predator when he must.
That flexibility and willingness to do what needs doing is what enables him to solve the murder he's wrongly accused of. It's a very dirty business that started him off on this search...it's not getting cleaner the further up the social hierarchy he goes. There are the usual noir novel twists, a resolution to the crime that requires a gigantic double-cross, and a setting where cold does the narrative job that heat does in Southern noirs: keeps everyone on edge, keyed up, on the point of suffering dire consequences.
It's a wonderfully gritty tale of an ugly side Sweden doesn't show the world. Voluntarily, anyway. Deeply satisfying.
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