Inspector Kurt Wallander, now brought to life in the PBS-TV series starring Kenneth Branagh, is the hero of a series of detective novels by bestselling Swedish crime writer Henning Mankell. Wallander was created when Mankell became concerned by what he saw when he returned to Sweden in 1989.

    “I’d been away from Sweden for some time,” says Wallander author Henning Mankell. “When I returned I became aware that racism was exploding. To me racism is a crime, so I thought I’d use a crime story. It was after that I realixed I needed a police officer. That’s how Kurt Wallander was born.” It took six months for Mankell to write the first Wallander novel, Mördare utan ansikte, Faceless Killers.

    Sidetracked, Mankell’s third Kurt Wallander mystery, is told from the perspectives of both the cop Wallander and the criminal. A teenage girl commits a violent suicide, a former justice minister is killed by a hatchet blow, with the peculiar twist that he’s scalped. Three more murders - hachet murders with scalpings - occur. Unable to find a link between the three murder victims, Wallander tries the American profiling technique. Can Wallander catch the killer before he strikes again?

    In August 1979 Ordfront published Mankell’s first book, Fångvårdkolonin som försvann, (The Correctional Institution that Disappeared). Mankell’s writing first came to Swedish editor Dan Israel’s attention in a collection of short stories. “I found one by Henning Mankell about a man building a porch,” says editor Dan Israel.

    Mankell now runs his own Swedish publishing house, Leopard, together with his old friend Israel. “We publish, for example, this year’s Nobel Prize Winner in Economics, Paul Krugman,” says Mankell.

    It was Dan Israel who introduced Mankell to Anneli Høier of Leonhardt & Høier Literary Agency in Copenhagen. “Anneli became my agent in the early 90s when the first two Wallander novels had been published,” says Mankell. “It seemed possible that there might be a chance of selling translation rights in a few countries.” Except for his children’s books, Høier has represented Mankell world-wide ever since.

    “I met Henning Mankell in the early 90’s when he was still unknown outside of Sweden,” says agent Anneli Høier. “I’ve never for a minute been in doubt that what Henning is writing is great literature. It’s been my aim to find him the best literary publishers and editors everywhere. We now count some forty languages and millions of copies.”

    Sidetracked was the winner of Sweden's 1997 Best Crime Novel of the Year. Henning Mankell’s detailed descriptions of Wallander’s life and his struggle to solve mysteries delight readers. Even those who wouldn’t normally read crime novels will be engaged by how Wallander copes with the situations he’s faced with.

    The Wallander mini-series starring Kenneth Branagh airs on PBS-TV Masterpiece though May 31st.

Sidetracked a Kurt Wallander Mystery by Henning Mankell. Trade Paperback, 432 pages, Publisher, Vintage (May 13, 2003), Language: English, ISBN: 9781400031566