Christian Unge is a hospital doctor in Stockholm, a background that informs his debut thriller. Unge’s protagonist is Tekla Berg, an emergency medic who feels burdened with her photographic memory. She’s introduced to us in a gripping scene where she is juggling patients. Then she is tasked with treating a young man who has 85% burns. The police think he’s a terrorist… but Tekla thinks she recognises her brother. 

The story that unfolds in Hell and High Water (translated from Swedish by George Goulding and Sarah de Senarclens) encompasses the Uzbek mafia and hospital bureaucracy amongst other things, a balancing act that Unge handles well. What I particularly like is that, for everywhere the plot goes, it ultimately comes back to a fundamental theme, that of family. All of that makes Hell and High Water an enjoyable debut. 

Published by MacLehose Press.