The Swimmer by Joakim Zander

Thriller

Klara Walldeen was orphaned as a baby and brought up by her grandparents in a remote part of Sweden. As an adult, she works in Brussels as a political aid. An ex-boyfriend reaches out to her to let her know she'll be in town and wondering if she wants to meet. Klara puts off getting back to him until she's called by him frantically saying he needs to meet. Hearing the urgency, Klara agrees and is brought in to a dangerous situation of the American government's secrets and what they are willing to do to make sure no one has access to them.

Before talking about the book, I want to mention how much I enjoy the cover art. It's difficult to tell from the picture, but the red of the cover is shiny and the ripples of the swimmer are raised. It's really an eye-catching cover.

Klara is a strong female character to centre most of the narrative around and she holds her own. Some thriller novels with female leads make the female weak in some way, usually with a love interest, but Zander didn't do this, for which I was thankful. Klara could have given up many times throughout the story but she didn't. She saw through to the end because of her strong morale foundation.

What I found amazing, and rather scary, about this book is how ruthless the government was willing to be to protect this secret. Local police were involved but had no clue what they were helping the American government do. Some small piece of me believes that this could happen and governments would be willing to take these steps to stop some secrets from being told.

This is a debut novel but it reads like an experienced thriller author. I had troubles putting this down. It's the best mystery/thriller I've read so far this year.

You can visit the author's Twitter if you're interested. Thank you to TLC Book Tours for letting me be a part of this tour.

First Line: "Every time I hold you is the last time I hold you."

Rating:
(4.5/5)