Translated by Marlaine Delargy.
Published 18th November 2025 by Amazon Crossing.
Audio book narrated by Laura Jennings.
From the cover of the book:
The slaying of a hotel developer in the Swedish mountains casts a shadow over a blissful vacation paradise in a chilling novel of suspense by the acclaimed author of Hidden in Shadows.
On Easter weekend, a guest at a luxury ski lodge in Åre is stabbed to death in her plush suite. She’s Charlotte Wretlind, a property developer who planned to restore a nearby mountain hotel to its long-gone glory days. It was not a random attack. It was an act of pure aggression levelled against a woman with plenty of enemies.
As the murder spreads panic among tourists and Åre residents alike, Detective Inspectors Hanna Ahlander and Daniel Lindskog face a shady staff, a dogged press, and multiple suspects. But the case takes a turn when a cleaning woman from the lodge is found strangled to death in the woods—and Charlotte’s son goes missing.
Hanna and Daniel plunge into a winding investigation tangled with damaged relationships, corrupt power players, betrayal, and, for Daniel, a personal struggle to process the memories of a painful past. As more troubling questions arise, one thing is certain: Åre’s killing season has only just begun.
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Easter weekend. Uncompromising businesswoman, Charlotte Wretlind, is in Åre to announce her controversial scheme to develop the abandoned ski lodge in Storlien, bringing it back to its former glory days - but she never makes it to the press conference. Instead, Charlotte is brutally murdered in her plush hotel suite at Copperhill Mountain Lodge by an aggressive assailant.
Detective Inspectors Hanna Ahlander and Daniel Lindskog, hampered by the holiday crowds, get stuck into the case. They are almost certain a member of staff at Copperhill must be responsible for the murder, but the fact that Charlotte clearly made a lot enemies in her business dealings (including resorting to a bit of bribery and corruption) means they have to keep an open mind.
The plot thickens when a member of the housekeeping staff at Copperhill is also killed, perhaps for something she spotted on the night of the murder, and Charlotte's distraught son goes missing. Any plans Hanna and Daniel had for a relaxing holiday are now well and truly off the cards.
Book three of this gripping Scandi noir series unfurls in familiar Viveca Sten style, via a number of perspectives related to the case. Hanna, Daniel, and their colleague Anton carry the police procedural side of the plot, with snippets about the continuing dramas of their personal lives on the side; and there are contributions from an anxious business associate of Charlotte's, her bewildered son, and Copperhill employees with skin in the game. Mixing up the story, there are two additional threads - one from a woman who suspects her husband of wrongdoing; and another that goes back in time to 1973 and the glamorous heyday of the Storlien mountain lodge, through the eyes of a young waitress whose romantic notions about an affluent guest she dubs 'Sean Connery' end in tragedy.
The short, punchy chapters weave back and forth between the propulsive investigation and the interconnecting threads, until they all collide in a tense hostage situation at the creepy abandoned lodge in Storlien (lovely Overlook Hotel vibes), where Hanna puts her life on the line.
Sten gets everything right in terms of pacing, character, and the significance of buried secrets about past misdeeds. The balance of murder investigation and personal lives of Hanna, Daniel and Anton is well-judged in this third book too, particularly when it comes to relationships - with Daniel's partner Eda finally being written with some depth, which makes her more relatable and far less annoying (thank goodness). I really enjoyed the up-turn in both Hanna and Anton's love lives, and there is a bomb-shell moment for Daniel which promises interesting developments in the next book.
This is definitely my favourite Åre Murders mystery yet! Nicely consumed via the audio book, narrated once again by Laura Jennings.
Looking forward to more Åre Murders in book four, Hidden in Lies, which is out 5th May.
Hidden in Memories is available to buy now in paperback, ebook and audio formats.
About the author:
Viveca Sten is the author of Hidden in Snow, Hidden in Shadows, and Hidden in Memories in the Åre Murder series—which has been adapted into a runaway #1 hit series on Netflix—and Buried in Secret, In Bad Company, In the Name of Truth, In the Shadow of Power, In Harm’s Way, In the Heat of the Moment, Tonight You’re Dead, Guiltless, Closed Circles, and Still Waters in the #1 internationally bestselling Sandhamn Murders series.
Since 2008, her books have sold more than ten million copies, and the Sandhamn Murders series has been adapted into a Swedish-language TV series shot on location and seen by an estimated one hundred million viewers around the world in close to a hundred countries. Today, Viveca divides her time between Stockholm, Sandhamn, and Åre.
About the translator:
Marlaine Delargy lives in Shropshire in the United Kingdom. She studied Swedish and German at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, and taught German for almost twenty years.
She has translated novels by many authors, including Kristina Ohlsson, Helene Tursten, John Ajvide Lindqvist, Therese Bohman, Theodor Kallifatides, Johan Theorin, with whom she won the Crime Writers’ Association International Dagger in 2010, and Henning Mankell, with whom she won the Crime Writers’ Association International Dagger in 2018.
Marlaine has also translated nine books in Viveca Sten’s Sandhamn Murders series, and Hidden in Snow, Hidden in Shadows, and Hidden in Memories in Sten’s Åre Murders series.
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