A murder
A resident of small-town Visberg is found decapitated in the forest
A festival
An isolated hilltop community celebrates ’Pan Night’ after the apple harvest
A race against time
As Visberg closes ranks, there could not be a worse time for Tuva Moodyson to arrive as deputy editor of the local newspaper. Tuva senses the scoop of her career, unaware perhaps that she is the story…
It’s Halloween season in Sweden and Tuva Moodyson is back in Bad Apples, the fourth in Will Dean’s superb series of books featuring everyone’s favourite journalist.
Regular readers of this little blog will be well aware of my love of this series. I’ve followed the adventures and misadventures of Tuva from the creepy forest of Utgard in Dark Pines, to the nefarious goings on at the Grimberg liquorice factory of Red Snow and then to Midsommar in Gavrik and her missing friend in Black River.
I’d been eagerly looking forward to Tuva’s latest adventure and promptly tucked into the Bad Apples as soon as it arrived in the summer. Then had to sit on my review for ages waiting for the blog tour to tell you just how good it is.
And hoo boy is it good. I loved the first three books, so the bar was set pretty high. Bad Apples is the pick of the already very very good bunch*.
*[Sorry, enough of the fruity puns]
Will Dean takes us to Visberg this time, an isolated little hilltop community, with plenty of weird happenings, odd characters and, of course, a crime for Tuva to investigate.
I love how Dean manages to create a sense of place in these books, and Visberg is a very odd place. He also puts our Tuva through the wringer again, and be warned, there are some scenes which are very much not for the squeamish. I’ve read a fair amount of crime fiction where unpleasant things happen, and even I winced a little at times!
Bad Apples may well be the fourth in the Tuva Moodyson series, but I think it would work as a jumping-in point for new readers. Though of course I highly recommend reading them all, on the offchance that you’ve somehow ignored me rabbiting on about these books for the past years.
Which of course you haven’t. So as a seasoned member of #TeamTuva, you’ll need no enticement from me to pick up this instalment.
Highly recommended doesn’t even begin to cover it.
Bad Apples by Will Dean is published by Point Blank and is out now. Many thanks to Margot Weale and Point Blank for the copy of the book to review, and to Anne Cater of Random Things Tours for inviting me to take part in the blog tour. Opinions are, of course, my own.
espresso coco 
Huge thanks for the blog tour support Dave xx