I’m not going to take anything away from Stieg Larsson. I read the Millennium trilogy and was enthralled by all three books, even THE GIRL IN THE SPIDER’S WEB by David Lagercrantz, which not a lot of people were crazy about. I mention this because if you liked any of those books, you should be reading Bernard Minier’s novels. Even if you hated them all, you should still be checking out Minier’s work. His protagonist is a damaged but undaunted French cop named Martin Servaz who has police work in his blood; it’s poisoning him slowly, yet he can’t help but succumb to it.

The two previous books in the series, THE FROZEN DEAD and THE CIRCLE, garnered widespread critical acclaim in the United States but didn’t enjoy the commercial success they deserved (and have received elsewhere in the world). Hopefully that will change with DON’T TURN OUT THE LIGHTS, the newly published third installment in the series. Here Minier informs, dazzles, horrifies and mystifies the reader, all the while ratcheting up the suspense level right up to thread-stripping tightness.

"Everything about DON’T TURN OUT THE LIGHTS, from the pacing and the plotting to the characterization and the atmosphere, is first rate."

Does that sound like a lot to live up to? Maybe, but I’m not really doing this tricky, smart story justice. It begins with Servaz residing (the term is used loosely) in a rest home of sorts for depressed and/or burnt-out cops after the events in THE CIRCLE. He is unsettled when he receives a rather grisly package that faintly echoes throughout the book before returning at the very end. Meanwhile, on Christmas Eve, a complicated woman named Christine Steinmeyer finds an unsigned note stuck in her mailbox. The anonymous epistle rambles just a bit, but the thrust of it is that the author is quite unhappy and blames Christine for her mental state, accusing Christine of actions she hasn’t committed and advising that the sender is going to commit suicide as a result.

Christine initially believes that the letter was misdirected and attempts to find the intended recipient without success. Over the next several days, however, she is subjected to an almost relentless stream of harassment, both at home and at her job as a radio show hostess, from an unknown assailant who seems to blame her for the suicide of the original, anonymous letter sender. The multiple assaults on Christine continue and indeed escalate to the point where she finds her personal and professional lives a shambles. But as things proceed, we slowly begin to learn things about Christine that increase the list of possible suspects who have targeted her.

Meanwhile, Servaz is also the recipient of some additional packages, one of which contains a hotel key and ultimately leads back to a closed case involving the suicide of a young woman. Readers are let in on the connection between the closed case and what is occurring with Christine long before Servaz becomes aware of it, but things will get even worse for Christine once he does. There are plenty of twists and turns to this story, which takes Servaz, Christine and the reader to some very unexpected places before the culprit(s) behind Christine’s difficulties are revealed and a rough justice is exacted on several fronts.

Everything about DON’T TURN OUT THE LIGHTS, from the pacing and the plotting to the characterization and the atmosphere, is first rate. Minier knows a great deal about a number of things and carefully researches what he doesn’t. The knowledge that he shares always enhances and never bogs down his story, which is terrifically complex without being weighed down. I can’t think of a better way to end the old year or to begin the new one than with this book (well, there might be one or two, but…).