Little Siberia - Antti Tuomainen

Antti Tuomainen isn't one to hold back or afraid that the reader might think he's taken things too far. Start out with a bang and keep it going. It may be set in a small village in the frozen East of Finland, but things heat up considerably in Little Sibera from a somewhat explosive and incredible opening. A former rally racing driver, banned now from racing after an accident killed his navigator, is on a 240kph drink-fuelled suicide run when a meteorite crashed to earth through his car. Well, that's one way start off a thriller.

And start as you mean to go on. The meteorite becomes hot property, if I can put it that way, its rare minerals placing a value on it of 1 million euros. It's being kept in a nearby museum while they wait for a team from Helsinki to come and collect it. They're taking their time because it's already attracted some menacing Russians from over the border to Hurmevaara and there are quite a few people in the village who see the prize as their way out of this frozen hellhole. They're going to have to get through Pastor Joel Huhta first, as he has volunteered to stay guard the precious object in its glass case for four nights. It doesn't seem to stop them all trying.

What they haven't perhaps counted on is that the Pastor is well equipped to deal with some of the trouble that comes his way, having once been stationed as an army pastor in Afghanistan, and seems to have little qualms about breaking the Commandment "Thou shalt not kill". The first night alone, he's knocked unconscious, follows the thieves, who it turns out have stolen a WWII grenade from the glass case by mistake, one of them blowing himself up in the process when it turns out to be live. Bit of an unfortunate mistake to make, but as I say, Antti Tuomainen is quite happy to keep events rattling along.

If that kind of situation isn't fraught and dramatic enough, Joel has other problems that perhaps give him an additional edge. He has some doubts about his faith and despite being happily married, he has developed a dangerous attraction for a waitress at the drinking all hours village nightclub. And his wife is pregnant, which she shouldn't be, because he was injured while in Afghanistan and can't have children. Add in suspicions about half the inhabitants of the village, a couple more deaths that don't seem to incite any investigation or questions (maybe the village is too small and remote to even have any police, but why slow things down with that?) and you've got an eventful four or five days ahead.

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