The Snowman

By Jo Nesbø

The first snow falls on Oslo, clean and quiet. By morning, a woman is missing. In her yard, a snowman stands where it shouldn’t, watching the house like a warning. Detective Harry Hole steps into a case that feels wrong from the start. No struggle. No clear suspect. Only a pattern that starts to surface as more families break apart. Women vanish. Winter keeps erasing footprints. And after each disappearance, a snowman appears. Built with care. Placed with intent. Harry teams up with a sharp young investigator and follows the trail through suburb streets, cold apartments, and files no one wants reopened. The deeper they go, the more the case looks like a ritual. A killer who plans around weather. A killer who doesn’t rush. A killer who wants to be remembered. Oslo turns into a frozen maze. Witnesses misremember. Old cases echo the new ones. The police chase shadows while the snow keeps falling, covering evidence, covering guilt, covering fear. Harry realizes the snowmen aren’t trophies. They’re countdowns. As the storm closes in, Harry has to connect the past to the present before the next snowfall brings another perfect, silent figure. Another empty house. And another name erased by winter.

Story added by sepanta_kazemi on December 7, 2025