Anne Holt
Anne Holt is Norway’s bestselling female crime writer. She was a journalist and news anchor and spent two years working for the Oslo Police Department before founding her own law firm and serving as Norway’s Minister for Justice in 1996 and 1997. Her first novel was published in 1993 and her books have been translated into over thirty languages and have sold more than 7 million copies. Her novel 1222 was nominated for an Edgar Award for Best Novel. She lives in Oslo with her family.
All Books By Anne Holt
From Norway’s #1 bestselling crime writer comes a suspenseful locked-room mystery, the US debut of a new series, set in an isolated hotel where guests stranded during a monumental snowstorm begin turning up dead.
A train on its way to the northern reaches of Norway careens off the track during a massive blizzard, 1,222 meters above sea level. The passengers abandon the train for a nearby, century-old hotel that is practically empty except for the staff. With plenty of food and shelter from the storm, the passengers think they are safe—until one of them turns up dead. With no sign of rescue and the storm continuing to rage, retired police inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen is asked to investigate. Paralyzed by a bullet lodged in her spine, Hanne has no wish to return to police work. Bitter and antisocial, she is slowly coaxed back to her old habits as curiosity and a natural talent for observation compel her to take an interest in the passengers and their secrets. When another body turns up, Hanne realizes that time is running out and she must act fast before panic takes over. Trapped in her wheelchair, trapped by the storm, and now trapped with a killer, Hanne has to fit the pieces of the puzzle together before they strike again.
Anne Holt’s books have sold more than five million copies in Europe, and her books are #1 bestsellers in Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, and Finland. Now she is poised to gain a huge American following with this captivating new mystery that pays homage to Agatha Christie and her classic book, And Then There Were None.
... Read moreBlessed Are Those Who Thirst
- By: Anne Holt
- Narrator: Kate Reading
- Length: 7 hours 20 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2013
- Language: English
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3.61(1537 ratings)
The second book in Edgar-nominated Anne Holt’s internationally bestselling mystery series featuring Detective Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen, last seen in Blind Goddess
It is only the beginning of May, but in Oslo a brutal heat wave has coincided with an alarming increase in violent crime. In the latest instance, police investigator Hanne Wilhelmsen is sent to a macabre crime scene on the outskirts of town. An abandoned shed is covered in blood. On one wall an eight-digit number is written in blood. There is no body–nor any sign of a victim. Is it a kid’s prank or foul play? Is it even human blood?
As more bloody numbers are found in isolated locations throughout Oslo, Hanne’s colleague H+Nkon Sand makes a startling discovery: the digits correspond to the filing numbers of foreign immigrants. All are female, all are missing. Is there a serial killer on the loose in Oslo? How does the killer have access to immigrant data?
Meanwhile, as the trail heats up, the victim of a horrific unsolved rape case and her father have each decided to take justice into their own hands. Hanne and H+Nkon soon discover that they aren’t the only ones on the hunt for the killer.
... Read moreBlind Goddess
- By: Anne Holt
- Narrator: Kate Reading
- Length: 11 hours 32 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2012
- Language: English
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3.46(2683 ratings)
A small-time drug dealer is found battered to death on the outskirts of the Norwegian capital, Oslo. A young Dutchman, walking aimlessly in central Oslo covered in blood, is taken into custody but refuses to talk. When he is informed that the woman who discovered the body, Karen Borg, is a lawyer, he demands her as his defender, although her specialty is civil, not criminal, law. The young man is adamant: he will speak to Karen Borg, and to her alone. A couple of days later, Hans E. Olsen, a lawyer of the shadiest kind, is found shot to death. Very soon, police officers Håkon Sand and Hanne Wilhelmsen establish a link between the two killings. They also find a coded message hidden in the murdered lawyer’s apartment. Their maverick colleague in the drug squad, Billy T., reports that a recent rumor in the underworld involves lawyers employed in drug dealing. Now the reason the young Dutchman insisted on having Karen Borg as a defender dawns on them: since she was the one to find and report the body, she is the only Oslo lawyer that cannot by any means be implicated in the crime. As the officers investigate, they uncover a massive network of corruption involving the highest levels of government.
As their lives are threatened, Hanne and her colleagues must find the killer and, in the process, bring the lies and deception out into the open.
... Read moreDead Joker
- By: Anne Holt
- Narrator: Kate Reading
- Length: 14 hours 0 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2016
- Language: English
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3.71(335 ratings)
From Anne Holt, the internationally bestselling author of 1222, comes the next installment in her Edgar Award-nominated mystery series.
Chief Public Prosecutor Sigurd Halvorsrud’s wife is found dead in front of the fireplace in the family living room. The cause of death: decapitation. Her husband, who witnessed the grisly murder and is himself covered in blood, immediately falls under suspicion, though he claims his wife’s killer was Stale Salvesen, a man he’d prosecuted years before. Detective Inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen is called in to lead the investigation with her old colleague, Billy T. Despite the circumstantial evidence, Hanne is unconvinced of Sigurd Halvorsrud’s guilt–that is, until a witness says he saw Stale Salvesen commit suicide by jumping off a bridge days before the murder took place. Then a journalist at one of Oslo’s largest newspapers is found beheaded. What links these two horrifically violent crimes?
The demanding investigation soon clashes with a terrible crisis in Hanne’s personal life. Cecilie, the woman she has lived with for almost twenty years, has fallen seriously ill and doesn’t have much time to live.
With a savage killer on the loose, Hanne must ask herself: Is the truth worth chasing at all costs?
... Read moreDeath of the Demon
- By: Anne Holt
- Narrator: Kate Reading
- Length: 9 hours 2 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2013
- Language: English
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3.58(1126 ratings)
From Edgar Award finalist Anne Holt comes the captivating third book in the series featuring the brilliant and tough police inspector Hanne Wilhelmsen, who must investigate the grisly murder of an orphanage director.
In an orphanage outside Oslo, a twelve-year-old boy is causing havoc. The institution’s aging director, Agnes Vestavik, sees something chilling in Olav’s eyes: sheer hatred. When Vestavik is found murdered, stabbed in the neck with a kitchen knife–with Olav nowhere to be found–the case goes to maverick investigator Hanne Wilhelmsen, recently promoted to superintendent in the Oslo police. Hanne suspects that Olav witnessed the murder and fled, and she orders an investigation of the orphanage staff. But Hanne is hopeless at delegating and sharing responsibilities. Only Hanne’s supreme deductive skills keep her on the job, but this is one case where her instincts are leading her astray.
Meanwhile, Olav makes his way to his once unfit mother’s apartment in central Oslo. When police finally catch up to him, Olav will lead them on a chase that will upend all of their assumptions. A dark and captivating new chapter in this brilliant, rollicking series, Death of the Demon examines that murky intersection between crime and justice.
... Read moreIn Dust and Ashes
- By: Anne Holt
- Narrator: Kate Reading
- Length: 12 hours 59 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2018
- Language: English
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3.9(270 ratings)
The final nail-biting installment in the ten-part, award-winning Hanne Wilhelmsen series from Scandinavia’s most celebrated female crime writer, Anne Holt
In 2001, three-year-old Dina is killed in a tragic car accident. Not long thereafter Dina’s mother dies under mysterious circumstances, and Dina’s father Jonas is convicted of her murder.
Now it’s 2016, and the cold case ends up on the desk of Detective Henrik Holme, who tries to convince his mentor Hanne Wilhelmsen that Jonas might have been wrongly convicted. Holme and Wilhelmsen discover that the case could be connected to the suicide of an eccentric blogger, as well as the kidnapping of the grandson of a EuroJackpot millionaire.
Twenty-four years in the writing, the ten books in Anne Holt’s internationally bestselling series is now complete. “Hanne is a character who’s going to get in your head–and stay there” (Entertainment Weekly). In Dust and Ashes is the exciting, not-to-be-missed conclusion to this terrific series.
... Read moreOne of Oslo’s hottest celebrity chefs is murdered and Hanne Wilhelmsen is called back into action in the sixth installment of the award-winning series from Anne Holt, Norway’s #1 bestselling crime writer.
When celebrity chef Brede Ziegler is discovered stabbed to death on the steps of the Oslo police headquarters, it sends a shock wave through the city’s hip in-crowd. Chef Ziegler had lots of famous associates. Could the culprit be among them, or was this a random act of violence?
Police investigator Billy T. takes on the case, but he is stymied by conflicting information about what kind of man Ziegler was. It seems nobody really knew him, not even his glamorous wife, his business partner, or the editor of his memoir. While Billy T. struggles to crack the case, Hanne Wilhelmsen returns to Oslo after a six-month absence. Hanne discovers that not only had Ziegler been stabbed, but he had also ingested a lethal dose of painkillers. As the plot thickens, Hanne and Billy T. are pulled deeper into the nefarious world in which Ziegler lived. Was he who he said he was? And can those who claim to have known him best be trusted? Hanne is determined to find the truth.
... Read moreOdd Numbers
- By: Anne Holt
- Narrator: Kate Reading
- Length: 13 hours 53 minutes
- Publisher: Blackstone Publishing
- Publish date: January 01, 2017
- Language: English
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3.76(216 ratings)
On an early April afternoon, a bomb goes off in the Oslo offices of the National Council for Islam in Norway, killing twenty-three people. The police and security service suspect an extremist organization to be responsible for the attack, a suspicion that grows stronger when threats reach authorities of a bigger explosion planned for the celebration of the Norwegian constitution.
As a special advisor on cold cases, Hanne Wilhelmsen has cut her official ties to the Security Service and lives contentedly–or at least as contentedly as she can manage–in solitude with her partner Nefis and their young daughter. A small computer monitor is Hanne’s only window to the outside until the day of the attacks, when her closed-off world is broken open. Hanne is approached by her long-lost friend, Billy T., whose son Linus has recently undergone some disturbing changes. As the mood of the city darkens, Hanne tries to help Billy T. reach out to Linus and realizes that Oslo is up against forces far more terrible and menacing than ever before.
... Read moreThe Lion’s Mouth
- By: Anne Holt
- Narrator: Rosalyn Landor
- Length: 13 hours 3 minutes
- Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
- Publish date: January 01, 2016
- Language: English
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3.48(682 ratings)
The country’s new female prime minister has been shot dead and the gun can’t be found in Anne Holt’s fourth mystery in the award-winning, internationally bestselling Hanne Wilhelmsen books that are “a natural for Jo Nesbo readers” (Booklist, starred review).
Less than six months after taking office, the Norwegian Prime Minister is found dead. She has been shot in the head. Was it a politically motivated assassination or personal revenge?
Hanne Wilhelmsen, chief inspector of the Oslo police, is on leave in California, but when the death shakes the country to its core, she knows she can’t remain on the sidelines of such a crucial investigation. The hunt for the Prime Minister’s killer is complicated, intense, and grueling. When secrets begin to unravel from the Prime Minister’s past, Hanne and her partner, Billy T., must solve the crime before a private tragedy becomes a public scandal in the most sensitive case of their careers.
Filled with lies, deception, and the truth about government, “The Lion’s Mouth tackles the ruthlessness of political power [in] the most sensitive investigation of Hanne Wilhelmsen’s career” (Financial Times). “The wonder and pleasure…is in how Ms. Holt weaves the strands of a political thriller, a police procedural, a locked-room mystery, and a domestic novel into a satisfying plot” (The Wall Street Journal).