THE SANCTUARY opens with a murder so brutal and horrific that I daresay it is one of the worst I have ever come across. It drives the entire novel and is referred to constantly throughout the narrative, hanging over the proceedings like a gloomy specter.

A man wakes up from a drugged stupor and surmises shortly thereafter that he is strapped to a board with a buzz saw heading towards his body. Whatever the worst fate is that you can imagine for him will come to pass as he is viciously sawed in half. Assigned to the case is Detective Anette Werner of Copenhagen’s Violent Crimes Department.

"THE SANCTUARY is indeed nightmare-inducing, and it will be nearly impossible for readers to shake it from their psyches."

Jeppe Kørner, Anette’s colleague, is on an indefinite leave of absence as he is nursing a broken heart, among other personal issues. He has taken refuge on the island of Bornholm to hunker down for the long winter. While there, he has befriended Esther de Laurenti, a writer who is working on the biography of Margrethe Dybris, a female anthropologist with a mysterious past. The research Esther is conducting surprisingly will come full circle and tie in to the discovery of the severed corpse.

A suitcase is found in a nearby park and turned into the police. To their horror, Anette and her team find what looks to be half of a human male, but where the other half is remains a mystery for the moment. It is nearly impossible to get a positive identification on the body, though it is believed that the poor soul could be Bo Tjørnelund, a bookkeeper who has been missing from his job.

The investigation leads to Bornholm, and Anette reaches out to Jeppe for assistance. It appears that this is not the small sanctuary that Jeppe had first imagined as connections to a sawmill on the island may play a major part in the murder case. Additionally, there are reproductions of old lettered correspondence from Margrethe that start innocently enough and then get increasingly creepy and eye-opening.

Katrine Enberg first came to international prominence with THE BUTTERFLY HOUSE, and she continues to show that she is a force to be reckoned with when it comes to Nordic noir thrillers. THE SANCTUARY is indeed nightmare-inducing, and it will be nearly impossible for readers to shake it from their psyches.