A volume of short works featuring the popular investigator features Wallander as a young patrolman on his first case, a new father facing unexpected danger on Christmas Eve, a middle-aged man solving a poisoning death, a separated husband investigating a photographer's murder, and a veteran detective connecting a dual murder to a plane crash.

In Sweden in 1956, eleven-year-old Joel and his father, a logger who was once a sailor, live alone with their secrets, including Joel's secret society that meets at night and his father's new romantic interest.

"Henning Mankell's last novel about an aging man whose quiet, solitary life on an isolated island off the coast of Sweden is turned upside down when his house catches fire. Fredrik Welin is a former surgeon who retired in disgrace decades earlier to a tiny island on which he is the only resident. He has a daughter he rarely sees and his mailman Jansson is the closest thing he has to a friend, and to an adversary. He is perfectly content to live out...

Stories that include: Wallander on his homicide first case as a twenty-one-year-old patrolman, as a young father facing unexpected danger on Christmas Eve, as a middle-aged detective with his marriage on the brink, as a newly separated investigator solving the brutal murder of a local photographer, and finally as a veteran detective, with his signature methodical and instinctive work style, discovering unexpected connections between a downed plane...

Sofia, who lost her legs as a child, is now grown up with children in Mozambique, but when she discovers that Armando, the father of her children, is cheating on her, she leaves him, igniting his terrible rage.

Detective Kurt Wallander investigates murders and other crimes in his hometown of Ystad in southern Sweden.

Detective Wallander works to solve cases in the city of Ystad along with his daughter and an eager young detective.

The overdose: A white car is parked by a side road in the beautiful landscape of Scania in southern Sweden. A child sits alone without an adult in sight. The child's father has been reported as missing, while the mother is in a psychiatric institution, unresponsive and apathetic. Kurt Wallander's failing health sees Linda take the lead in the case. It will touch her deeply as she discovers that the child has been unscrupulously tricked, exploited...

The Tricksters: A farmer is apparently kicked to death by a horse, until Detective Wallander investigates and uncovers clues suggesting a different scenario--one that involves a mysterious woman the farmer had met through the personal ads. Kurt and Linda bait the killer with their own personal ad and soon find themselves in hot water. The Photographer: An American tourist is found dead and her husband demands the body and all her possessions be returned....

Wallander is Ystad's veteran detective who's finally learned to find respite from the job in the moments of grace that come from living on the beach with his dog, Jussi, or spending time with his granddaughter. He's still on the outs at work, however: offbeat methods make him an irritant for management and his colleague, Martinsson, is angling for his position. But no one in the department has the uncanny sense of the criminal mind that he does.