Product Description

This is the story about two women who are trapped by a past that won't let go. As Maj-Britt festers malevolently in her hermetic apartment, appeased only by an endless supply of food, Monika works ceaselessly to blot out her pain, punishing herself unforgivingly if she fails to meet her own high standards. They have nothing in common but the determination to obliterate their memories and be left alone - but when a letter and a tragic accident force the past back to life, the emotional void at the centre of their lives gapes wide and threatens to engulf them both. Forced into a confrontation, each woman proves the catalyst for the other's destruction - or salvation. A taut psychological thriller, "Shame" builds inexorably and subtly into a study of the devastating powers of fear, oppressive religion and forbidden sexuality.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #75514 in Books
• Published on: 2007-05-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 352 pages

Review
"Reminiscent of Ruth Rendall at her best." Herald "Relentless and frightening." Guardian "A compulsive thriller." Metro "Alvtegen keeps up a cracking pace." Uncut"

About the Author
Karin Alvtegen is regarded as one of the most exciting crime writers in Scandinavia. Her second novel Missing, was awarded the premier Scandinavian crime writing award and is being made into a TV series. She lives in Stockholm.

Customer Reviews

Not your typical thriller...
This is an interesting story, and an interesting approach to telling it. Alvtegen has a nice sense of how we miss opportunities, and how we can turn in on ourselves when misery strikes.
It is not a conventional thriller, in that there are not car chases, explosions, or hitmen. It is a slow-burning fuse, which invites you to see how instinctive decisions can stay with us throughout our lives. It is a story of suppression, oppression, and depression; it is convincingly told, and satisfyingly concluded.

A psychological profile rather than crime fiction
Karin Alvtegen's Shame is an excellent character study marred by a loose denouement. As long as the character development proceeds, it is engrossing enough, although I found it rather difficult to empathise with the motivations of the deeply flawed doctor, who is one of the two women whose lives eventually intersect in tragedy. Monika has lived under the suppurating, slowly strangling shadow of her dead brother and her mother's hatred; to compensate for the inadequacy and incompleteness she has felt, she has overachieved professionally, and run away from every relationship that could have salved her. Meanwhile, Maj-Britt, morbidly obese and curdling with poison, has been ruined by her upbringing by fundamentalist Christian parents, and sees people as nothing better than targets of her venom. Monika weighed down by the guilt and grief very like that felt by Ben Affleck's character in the film Bounce, tries to make amends to the family of an acquaintance who had taken her place in a car journey and died in an accident on the way. She is unable to distinguish selfless help and interference, and gets more and more deeply involved in the victim's family. When Maj-Britt figures out Monika's motivations, she likes nothing better than to blackmail Monika, and from that point, the book begins to lose its power. Still, it was good going until that point.

Not a Thriller
This is definitely not a thriller, it's a novel about how some people allow the past to define their present, and allow shame to dominate their lives. At one point I felt I couldn't continue reading it as the story was so depressing but I did and I won't say I 'enjoyed' it but felt that it was definitely worth reading.