The Snowman

“The boy said something again, and she glanced in the mirror. ‘What did you say?’ she said in a loud voice. He repeated it but still she couldn’t hear. She turned down the radio while heading toward the main road and the river, which ran through the countryside like two mournful black stripes. And gave a start when she realized he had leaned forward between the two front seats. His voice sounded like a dry whisper in her ear. As if it were important no one else heard them. ‘We’re going to die.’”

This opening chapter features an anonymous boy, as yet unidentified, and the introduction of a snowman. At the end of the novel, in Part 5, this scene will be replayed from a different perspective—the boy is Mathias, and this is the fundamental scene that shapes him as a man and a killer. In this first chapter, what the boy says sounds ominous, and when the scene is played again, it continues with Mathias killing his mother, and nearly killing himself, committing his first murder.

“He practiced speed-cuffing the table leg, which was already splintered as a result of this new bad habit of his. […] The aim was to bang the cuffs against the arrestee’s wrist in such a way that the spring-loaded arm closed around the wrist and the lock clicked on the other side. With the right amount of force and accuracy you could cuff yourself to an arrestee in one simple movement before he had a chance to react. Harry had never had any use for this on the job and only once for the other thing he had learned over there: how to catch a serial killer.”

Harry’s experience training with the FBI has taught him about catching serial killers. This has made him Norway’s most preeminent detective, and the only one with experience hunting serial killers. The other thing he learned with the FBI, speed-cuffing, is just something he does to pass the time; however, in the end, it will be the key to both catching the Snowman and saving his own life in the climactic scene.

“She sat down on the stool opposite him and ordered an aperitif. Campari, it went without saying. Harry used to call her ‘Cochineal’ after the natural pigment that gave the spicy sweet wine its characteristic color. Because she liked to dress in bright red. Rakel had herself claimed that she used it as a warning, the way animals use strong colors to tell others to keep their distance.”

Harry’s relationship with Rakel is important in the novel—at first his narrative with her seems separate from the mystery. However, as the novel continues, Rakel plays an important part in the serial killer story as well. In Harry’s mind, and in the narrative,