The Laughing Policeman
A Martin Beck Police Mystery

One of the things I dig most about the "Martin Beck" mysteries is that they are only named "Martin Beck" mysteries out of convenience. He's the highest ranking policeman in Sjowall and Wahloo's Stockholm Homicide Division, and a couple of the early books tended to focus on him, but as the series goe......more

There aren’t a lot of laughs in The Laughing Policeman, which is the best known and most acclaimed of the Martin Beck detective series by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö, set in Stockholm. Published in 1968 in Sweden, it was translated into English in 1971, when it won the Edgar Award for Best Mystery. P......more

Laughter is hard to find in The Laughing Policeman, a singularly grim police procedural that centers around a Swedish police team’s investigation of a mass murder that took place on board a bus in Stockholm. Such a scenario might seem counterintuitive, because we all know that Sweden is one of the s......more

After finishing The Man on the Balcony, I decided to go back for more of Martin Beck and his colleagues, and I'm so happy I did. The Laughing Policeman is the fourth in the Martin Beck series, and so far it is my favorite from this writing duo. While the police in Stockholm are busy at the American E......more

This book won the Edgar Award for best novel in 1971 and it is easy to see why. It is a mesmerizing tale right from the first sentence, maybe the best in this series that I have read so far. As with the three earlier books, this one is deceptively simple in construction. It is told in laconic "this......more