Henning Mankell is a Swedish author, who was born in Stockholm in 1948. His works include another 8 books in the Kurt Wallander series, which are translated from the original language of Swedish into a total of 19 other languages including English. His previous jobs include acting and theatre directing.

In this action packed sequel to the gripping "Faceless Killers", Kurt Wallander is back with yet another mystery to solve. The Ystad police department receive a phone call revealing that a life raft carrying two dead men has been washed up on the southern Swedish coast. The circumstances of this unmarked life raft however, are of a strange nature. The two men in the life raft have clearly been tortured and shot to death but their expensive suit jackets appear to be in top condition, therefore likely to have been returned to their bodies after gunshot took their lives. Also, why are their bodies in a hugging embrace? Wallander gets on the case to find an answer to these strange circumstances. However, when it is revealed that the life raft actually travelled across the Baltic Sea from Latvia, Wallander wishes for the Latvian police to take over the investigation, which seems hopeful when Latvian Major Leipa flies to Sweden to review the situation. Wallander's hopes are then shattered upon Major Leipa's return to Latvia as the Major meets his death the same night of his homecoming. Wallander finds himself travelling to Latvia to assist the Police in Riga with investigating Major Leipa's death. Wallander assumes that Leipa discovered something important and he persists in finding out what it is separate and secretly from the Latvian police because of his distrust in their integrity.

"The Dogs of Riga" is set in 1992, when the country of Latvia had just become independent from the break up of the Soviet Union. This novel digs deep behind the official sovereignty of the state to reveal a time of instability and hope for democracy to become a reality. Henning Mankell actually worked closely with somebody from the Latvian police to help him with writing this novel.

This book appears to have two sections within it. At the beginning, you think that the whole novel is going to be about the strange circumstances surrounding the life raft but then it surprised me that this was solved so early on in the book. The focus then became centred on Latvia's problems at that time and Wallander being stuck in the middle of it! This second section was definitely fascinating but it didn't seem as much like a crime novel, which I expected the first story to develop into. It felt more like a story, which was stumbling across clues rather than solving a mystery. I feel that this is much to do with Wallander being kept in the dark by the Latvian police so he struggles to work properly. However, towards the end of the book we do see more of Wallander doing what he does best, solving mysteries. This would have been preferred throughout the book though! Mankell's style of writing is very readable and is successful in painting a picture of what's happening within the book. Not as much tension is built up compared to Mankell's "Faceless Killers", which is also likely to be because of Wallander's lack of insight into the Latvian Police's investigation.

• Anyone who is interested in the history and state of Latvia.
• Anyone who enjoys books by authors such as Stephen King, Agatha Christie, John Grisham and Wilbur Smith
• Anyone who likes any kind of crime novel

• Anybody who prefers a classic crime novel
• Anybody who doesn't like crime novels

*Further Information*

Faceless Killers
The White Lioness
The Man Who Smiled
Sidetracked
The Fifth Woman
One Step Behind
Firewall
Pyramid
The Grave