Away from the classic cold, dark and lonely environments of the Scandinavian crime novel,
Before the Clouds
Come (Maeva) is a story with an unusual context.
The Swedish journalist Mari Jungstedt (Stockholm, 1962) has transferred her characters to an environment where there is no snow, but there are flamenco classes,
fried
fish and white villages.
The
best selling author
He has left behind the cold island of Gotland, southeast of Sweden, where up to 16 of his previous works are developed so that his new protagonists can savor the Malaga beach and the Andalusian sun.
"I just like this area a lot," explains a smiling Jungstedt, who has sold more than 6.5 million copies of his books, translated into 20 languages, and who arrived in Malaga this Monday to promote the publication in Spanish of the work .
It's the first in a series that she hopes will stretch out as long as Gotland's, which has made her one of the best-selling authors in her country.
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"Dad, why aren't you a Swedish writer?"
Just as inspector Kurt Wallander —protagonist of Heninng Mankell's novels— develops his investigations in the Swedish city of Ystad and Harry Hole —curator of works such as
Robin
, by Jo Nesbø— does so in Oslo, policeman Héctor Correa works in the Costa del Sol. He is the agent who takes the reins of a story that begins in the pure classic style of the
thriller
Nordic: a murder.
It takes place in the Tajo de Ronda, a great symbol of this city of Malaga, but from there the text travels through the local geography.
She does it to Marbella or to the small town of Benagalbón, just over 20 kilometers from the center of Malaga and where the translator Lisa Hagel seeks to rebuild her life.
The story also has a wide gap for the neighborhood of El Palo, to the east of the capital.
And visit restaurants such as La Candelaria, El Tintero, Canta el Gallo or Bardal, run by chef Benito Gómez.
Beyond its Malaga setting, the structure of the work and its intrigues are the classics of the
Nordic
thriller .
That yes,
Before the clouds arrive
(published in Sweden in 2020) stands out for its brevity —287 pages— and for its everyday characters, far removed from some of the stereotypes of the genre.
This is the case of the homicide investigator Héctor Correa, with a family, optimistic and who has already experienced his great love.
“I like to use more or less normal people in whom the reader can feel reflected”, emphasizes the writer.
The same thing happens to Lisa Hagel, who wants to find a job as a translator and, almost unwittingly, manages to help the policeman with her job.
Both in maturity, share a feeling of loneliness and lack of love, but look to the future with some hope after meeting in dance classes at the Flamenco Museum.
There she signed Jungstedt books this Tuesday after a photo session.
Mari Jungstedt next to the sculpture of Pablo Picasso in Malaga.García-Santos
The plot moves away from the usual great social themes of
Nordic noir
such as immigration or violence against women, but in exchange it recounts a dark chapter of Franco's Spain, which serves as a backdrop and the author prefers not to reveal it to readers.
“It is a theme present in all my books: how what happens to you in childhood marks you later as an adult.
It is the real reason why I write crime novels”, emphasizes Jungstedt, for whom the Spanish context of her story has been “a great challenge”.
“I am someone from Stockholm writing about the south of Spain, but I was also someone from outside when I was writing about the island of Gotland.
In the end, the key is to do the research very well before writing”, says the author in a dignified Spanish that she studied as a young man and improved during her years as a tourist guide before working for 14 years on Swedish television and public radio.
Since he published his first book in 2003, which sold 5,000 copies, Jungstedt has become a
best-seller
in his country.
After publishing several of her novels in Spanish, her first attempt to approach her country was in 2015 with the publication of
Mar de Nubes.
.
He then lived in Arguineguín (Gran Canaria), where he placed the novel written with the Norwegian Ruben Eliassen, with whom he then shared his life.
The relationship broke down and, although she published a second book in his Canarian series, she realized that she preferred to change the third.
“Something that was 100% original to me,” she emphasizes.
He chose Malaga out of pure affinity, because he barely knew the province.
And in 2019, with a map and a car, he began to select locations.
He traveled through the mountain villages and walked through the city near the sea.
“I like to get to know the places well, their colors, their sounds.
The story is the most important thing in a crime novel, but the characters and that environment are also important to hook the reader”, he points out.
Before the clouds arrive, it
is easy to read and predisposes for a binge.
There is no rest in the adventures of Héctor Correa and Lisa Hagel, nor in their timid friendship on the way to something else, nor in their search for the mysterious murderer, but this will not be the last case together.
Jungstedt presents this book in Spain just three weeks after doing the same in his country with the second volume set in Malaga.
It is titled
Andra sidan månen
(
On the other side of the moon
, with no publication date yet in Spain) and is number 20 in 20 years for the Swedish author, who now intends to alternate the publication of a book from the Gotlam series with another from the Malaga series.
Both have worked well in Sweden, but the writer opens her eyes in anticipation of how the Spanish public will welcome Correa and Hagel.
"I have no idea," she points out amused.
She now it's up to the readers to write that story.
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