Liza Marklund: The Bomber

By MICHELE HEWITSON

Somebody has let off a bomb inside Stockholm's new Olympic arena a mere month before the games are about to open. Annika Bengtzon is a hotshot cop reporter with a bad temper and a burning ambition. She's not nice but she's good at getting the story.

So in the early hours of a frozen morning just before Christmas, she's there at the scene where there are bits of bodies all over the stadium and cops who refuse to talk. In the newsroom there are bits of egos all over the place and Annika has a secretary and more than a few colleagues who aren't talking to her.

At home, hubby and the two kids aren't too impressed either with a wife and mother who would rather spend her time scrambling through snowdrifts and behind crime-scene lines than do the Christmas shopping.

The Bomber has a good racy plot but Marklund's primer on how a newspaper office works drags down the action. Because, despite trying to spice up life at a Stockholm daily with office intrigue, it's still just life at the office.

Pocket Books

$22.95