Adler-Olsen's Department Q series has been selling well enough in Scandinavia and the UK to warrant a following in the U.S. But, I wouldn't think that this is the book that will prove to be up to the task.

The good news about this book is the primary plot line, which I thought had considerable promise.

Department Q is headed up by Det. Insp. Carl Morck, who gets roped into shuffling off to Borholm, Denmark with his team to help solve the case that virtually ruined the life and career of a retired police sergeant. This man, now retired, couldn't stop thinking about the case for 17 years -- ever since he saw the lifeless body of "vivacious" teen Alberte Goldschmid found hanging from a tree in an apparent hit-and-run at high speed.

The tragedy is described in a prologue dated November 20th, 1997. It establishes that, indeed, the victim was hit by a car. But, was it a hit-and-run?

In April of 2014, that sergeant, Christian Habersaat, the only man who thought it was more than that, who had been tracking Morck's recent string of successes in closing bedeviling cold cases, puts in a call to the great solver to plead for his help. Morck's first reaction is to suggest someone else for Habersaat to contact, having no desire to leave his station. As Adler-Olsen puts his protagonist's thoughts:

Clearly, Morck's answer to Habersaat's appeal amounts to an attempted put off, but as he listens for the caller's reply there is only silence. No reply. The phone goes dead; shortly after which Habersaat is found dead in a publically staged suicide at his retirement celebration -- presumably to put an end to his obsession to find a killer whom every one of his peers in the room with him have always considered non-existent.

What appears to be a subplot involves a peculiar sun cult called the Nature Absorption Academy which seems to come out of nowhere but may have been introduced in an earlier novel in the Department Q series.