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The Man on the Balcony (Martin Beck #3)
The chilling third novel in the Martin Beck mystery series by the internationally renowned crime writing duo Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö, finds Martin Beck investigating a string of child murders.In the once peaceful parks of Stockholm, a killer is stalking young girls and disposing their bodies. The city is on edge, and an undercurrent of fear has gripped its residents. Ma...more
Paperback, 192 pages
Published
January 19th 2011
by Vintage
(first published 1967)
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Stieg Larsson (The Girl With Dragon Tattoo trilogy) was inspired by Henning Mankell, who is nearly as famous as Larsson. And Mankell was inspired by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö, or rather, Martin Beck, the detective they created. And Sjöwall and Wahlöö were inspired by Simenon's Maigret...
The books in this series were published in the 1960s-1970s, and now one would have to define these stories as vintage police procedurals. Martin Beck was apparently Maigret for the Scandinavian crime. The M...more
The books in this series were published in the 1960s-1970s, and now one would have to define these stories as vintage police procedurals. Martin Beck was apparently Maigret for the Scandinavian crime. The M...more
The Man on the Balcony by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö starts out with what seems to be a crank call. An elderly woman phones the police to complaining about a "nasty" man who stands on his own balcony for hours at a time--just staring at the traffic and the children at play in the streets below. Before long that call is forgotten as the Stockholm police are confronted with a child-killer. Someone is stalking young girls (average age of ten) and then molesting and killing them in the cit...more
The Man on the Balcony: a Martin Beck mystery, by Maj Sjöwall, Per Wahlöö, narrated by Tom Weiner, produced by Blackstone Audio, downloaded from audible.com.
This book begins with what the police first believe to be a crank call from an old woman who claims that she, when she uses binoculars, can see a youngish man across the street who stands on his balcony for hours at a time, day or night, and seems to be watching the street and the children playing there. The police write her of...more
This book begins with what the police first believe to be a crank call from an old woman who claims that she, when she uses binoculars, can see a youngish man across the street who stands on his balcony for hours at a time, day or night, and seems to be watching the street and the children playing there. The police write her of...more
Start reading Man on the Balcony and then just try to put down this breakthrough murder-mystery by the author couple Maj Sjövall and Per Wahlöö. With masterful pacing, noir atmosphere, and a minimalist writing style, they relate the story of how detective Martin Beck and his colleagues confront an excruciatingly difficult investigative challenge. As the stakes grow, so does the tension not only for the police but also for the reader. Social cohesion itself is in jeopardy as the number of victims...more
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It's the Swedish version of "Law & Order," friends. I've read now several reviews that describe Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo's Martin Beck mystery series as both the birth place of the Swedish crime book and also as a staple and perfection of the police procedural (even the back cover brags of this last). That's actually a perfect encapsulation. The pace is slower than the vaunted TV reference, but otherwise, this is exactly the kind of thing I'd expect to see in re-runs on TNT: a summer...more
i am confused because the edition i have clearly says this is the second in the series, not the third. but hey, who gives a shit? it was really good. not as good as Roseanna, which made me cry for a long time afterward, but still, what they're doing here is pretty amazing. somehow, by limiting themselves to very simple actions, and very little insight into the minds of the characters, they are creating very real and believable people that i am quite fond of and invested in. there are ten books i...more
One of the pioneering Inspector Martin Beck series, this is my favorite so far (I have read 6 of the 9 titles.) In it, Beck and his team have to stop a man who is sexually assaulting and then killing little girls in Stockholm's parks.They also have a string of unnecessarily brutal muggings to deal with and the two sprees may be linked.
Beck's creators and Georges Simenon (his detective in Inspector Maigret of the paris police)wrote in the 1960s and 1970s and to a large degree invente...more
Beck's creators and Georges Simenon (his detective in Inspector Maigret of the paris police)wrote in the 1960s and 1970s and to a large degree invente...more
De Man op het Balkon is het derde deel in de zeer vermakelijke Martin Beck serie van Maj Sjöwall en Per Wahlöö. In mijn ogen is dit boek ook de beste van de eerste drie. De plot zelf is in lijn met de voorgaande twee boeken, maar het is allemaal net even wat meeslepender en de introductie van een nieuw karakter was een erg goede keuze.
Al snel in het verhaal stapt namelijk Gunvald Larsson binnen. Een bonkige reus met botte mariniershumor die als tegenpool gezien kan worden van Martin ...more
Al snel in het verhaal stapt namelijk Gunvald Larsson binnen. Een bonkige reus met botte mariniershumor die als tegenpool gezien kan worden van Martin ...more
well before the world was consumed by the famous trilogy featuring the "girl who..." a couple of writers created a revolutionary detective story series which revolutionized the mystery genre, Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö created the 10 book series featuring the intriguing and anti-hero detective Martin Beck. I am going through the series & I love it!
This third book is incredible. The tension builds up & the combination of routine police work and triumph of imagination is out of sig...more
This third book is incredible. The tension builds up & the combination of routine police work and triumph of imagination is out of sig...more
Wahoo and Sjowall are consistently good- of the four Martin Beck mysteries I've read, all have been memorable page-turners, and one (#4, "The Laughing Policeman") was one of the best I've ever read. This book doesn't quite live up to that standard, but it is an enjoyable, fast-paced procedural that you'll want to finish in one sitting. Particularly interesting here was how the authors modified the typical police novel setup, by revealing the murderer in the title and first page of th...more
This book along with the first two in the series is an enjoyable procedural ride (and kudos to translator Alan Blair for capturing a consistent style and tone). I like the intriguing main character, police inspector (can't recall exact title) Martin Beck, as well as the ancillary characters, who the authors are starting to flesh out. Thus far each book is under 200 pages, but it feels like they pack a lot into each novel without clipping the stories short. The writing style is understated, su...more
Now that's more like it!
This is the second in the "Story of Crime" series by Sjowall and Wahloo and there is such a sense of urgency to this one that it truly is hard to put down.
The case involves a serial killer/rapist of very young girls and the police are, naturally, more than determined to catch him. There is much less plodding and far more action.
What is really fascinating, are the two main witnesses that crop up in the case: one is a rather violent ...more
This is the second in the "Story of Crime" series by Sjowall and Wahloo and there is such a sense of urgency to this one that it truly is hard to put down.
The case involves a serial killer/rapist of very young girls and the police are, naturally, more than determined to catch him. There is much less plodding and far more action.
What is really fascinating, are the two main witnesses that crop up in the case: one is a rather violent ...more
This novel was first published in 1968, and I must say it holds up pretty well. It is the better of three first novels about Martin Beck. Sjöwall & Wahlöö manage to not only capture the police procedures but also move you to city of Stockholm, Sweden for a week or so of high anxiety in the early summertime of 1967. The opening scene is a beautiful description of a city waking up in the morning and sets the backdrop for the rest of the story. The story is loosely built up a real case happening in...more
Every bit as powerful and disturbing as the first Martin Beck criminal investigation. "Good" is not an adjective to be used when describing a novel about a psychopat molesting and killing children. Grief, anger, despair and exhaustion are on the daily menu for the police force. Long hours of combing through irrelevant information, following misleading tips, waiting almost helpless for the killer to strike again and maybe make a mistake. But never giving up.
This series shoul...more
This series shoul...more
This is the third in the series of ten Martin Beck books. The detectives are faced with two problems at once: someone who doesn’t hesitate to use violence if it makes his life easier is mugging vulnerable people in parks. The second is even more serious: a man is murdering young girls. Though both cases take up much time and effort they are connected in that the mugger has probably seen the murderer without realising it, so tracking him down is even more important.
Despite the methodi...more
Despite the methodi...more
Before there was Henning Mankell and the rest of the Swedish mystery writers there was Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo, a husband and wife writing team.
The authors of the Martin Beck series created an image of Stockholm and Sweden that made the city and country accessible to readers before travel to Europe became customary. Martin Beck and the other members of the homicide squad are looking forward to a quiet summer. The biggest problem facing the police is a series of muggings...more
Esta es la segunda novela que leo de Maj Sjöwall y Per Wahloo. La primera fue Roseanna, que mereció 4 estrellas según mi percepción de la misma y de la que -por pura desidia- no llegué hacer ningún comentario en su momento. No voy a regresar para hacer esa crítica, no obstante, si voy a detenerme para hablar de esta segunda novela que leo de este matrimonio sueco; considerados hoy día padre y la madre de la novela policíaca moderna.
Esta novela, tal como la que ya leí de los mismos auto...more
Esta novela, tal como la que ya leí de los mismos auto...more
Terzo romanzo del ciclo dell'ispettore Beck, l'ambientazione di questo libro continua a essere la Stoccolma degli anni '60; per amor di precisione, l'inchiesta sugli omicidi di alcune bambine si svolge tra giugno e luglio 1967. Come già in Roseanna, abbiamo un poliziesco più che un giallo, e il protagonista non è né un eroe né un antieroe, ma solamente uno sbirro che cerca di fare il proprio lavoro al meglio. La trama all'inizio è un po' troppo spezzata per i miei gusti, ma col passare delle pag...more
A naked woman was dredged up from the bottom of Sweden's beautiful Lake Vattern one July day. Where had she come from? How had she got there? And why? . . . a rash of brutal muggings and child sex-murders with the elusive mugger perhaps the only person in Stockholm to have seen the murderer . . . the search for a hard-drinking well-known Swedish journalist in Budapest, who has vanished without a trace . . . eight people were shot to death in a Stockholm bus, with one of the dead being an ambitio...more
Martin Beck investigates a deeply disturbing case of 3 young girls found murdered in the parks of Stockholm. A spate of muggings is also taking place in the city and this time, the police conclude that the perpertrator must be the only person to have seen the child killer while lurking in the park bushes. Martin and his team are under immense public pressure to solve both crimes as quickly as possible. Nothing is known of the killer until Martin remembers something by chance from a former inq...more
I'm finding these Martin Beck books fascinating. On the one hand, the language is so crisp (at least in translation) that they seem thoroughly modern, as if they were written today as period pieces of life in Sweden in 1960s. On the other hand, they are like time capsules of a life without cellphones, where computers are just starting to arrive on the scene, where it's ok to smoke on an airplane. The only real crime is that there is only 10 of these gems.
Sjöwakk and Wahlöö's 1968 police novel, as procedural as they come. The culmination is almost beside the point. It barely makes it into the book.
I got a kick out of the new character, Gunvald Larsson, a pretentious hulk of a detective with "shoulders like a heavyweight boxer and huge hands covered with shaggy blond hair." Martin Beck is even more of a wreck. So satisfying. A Man on the Balcony is number three in the series; seven to go.
I got a kick out of the new character, Gunvald Larsson, a pretentious hulk of a detective with "shoulders like a heavyweight boxer and huge hands covered with shaggy blond hair." Martin Beck is even more of a wreck. So satisfying. A Man on the Balcony is number three in the series; seven to go.
Do you ever have one of those nights where you wake up and realize that you're not going back to sleep? And then you look at the clock and it isn't even 12 yet? This is a good book to have on your nightstand. Deeply satisfying Swedish detective novel featuring a hardboiled detective who prefers juice to liquor and grumbles about the drug war and the death penalty. One key plot point hinges on the availability of affordable childcare.
Martin Beck is growing on me. He's a difficult man to like but somehow you feel like you're right in side his thoughts and you begin to understand why he is and does what he does. A man totally dedicated to police work. The books stand alone though he did make reference to past murders and victims but not to the point that it would have detracted if you'd not read the previous books. An excellent collaboration
Three novels into the Martin Beck series, and I have the feeling that this is one that will stick with me. The focus is (as always with Beck) on the methodical and not always successful efforts of the police to unravel the crime. The abrupt ending and lack of any real explanations drive that home, with the actual murderer only figuring on a few pages of the book, and no attempt made to explain why they did what they did.
I first read this series in the sixties and seventies. Over the years I had re-read the first of the series, Roseanna, several times - I consider it one of the all time great mystery novels. Now, I'm re-reading the entire series. This, the third Martin Beck, is a masterful depiction of policing. There is a crime and it is solved, but the book is mainly about the detectives and how they relate to their world and their jobs. The procedural aspects are a fascinating look at a world before desk...more
Another great book in the Martin Beck police procedural series. These books together represent the police procedural genre and have influenced other writers of these books since their publication. Check my other reviews of other books in this series for more information. Suffice it to say this title is another fine addition to the Martin Beck series.
This time it's 1967 and Martin Beck and his fellow detectives are on the hunt for a child killer. Simply written and fast moving to me these almost have the feel of a Swedish Dragnet, only a little more dark and graphic. I've heard this series called the foundation of the modern Scandinavian crime novels such as Wallander and others and I can see it.
I really think these mysteries are not to miss if you like classic mysteries. This one had an ending I really liked--I was left with my reaction rather than the detectives'. And I also enjoyed the puzzle aspect, as in an old Agatha Christie, but with the Hercules Poirot role being split up among all the characters.
When I'm done all ten, I might write more. So far all the women are characterized as kind of nymphomaniac -- is that the sixties just waking up to women's ordinary sexuality...more
When I'm done all ten, I might write more. So far all the women are characterized as kind of nymphomaniac -- is that the sixties just waking up to women's ordinary sexuality...more
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Swedish author. Best known for the collaborative work with her husband Per Wahlöö on a series of ten novels about the exploits of Martin Beck, a police detective in Stockholm.
Series:
* Martin Beck
More about Maj Sjöwall...
Series:
* Martin Beck
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