Review of THE FORGOTTEN DEAD by Tove Alsterdal

 3.5 Stars

I recently read We Know You Remember by this Swedish author and I quite enjoyed it (https://schatjesshelves.blogspot.com/2022/07/review-of-we-know-you-remember-by-tove.html) so decided to read The Forgotten Dead, a standalone novel she wrote a few years ago.

Patrick Cornwall, a freelance investigative journalist, goes missing while working on a story in Paris.  His wife Ally flies to Europe to find him after she has not heard from him in a while.  She learns that he has been investigating illegal migrants being used for slave labour.  As Ally retraces her husband’s movements, she realizes that he has learned that people at the highest levels of government and society are involved in human trafficking and exploitation and that they will do anything to protect their interests.  Interspersed with Ally’s search for Patrick are sections set in Tarifa, Spain, where a Swedish tourist discovers the body of a black man presumed to be an African migrant. 

What most interested me is the author’s tackling of an important social issue:  “The figure 30 million was an estimate of the number of slaves in the world today . . . compared . . . to the 12 million slaves transported across the Atlantic – and that was over a period of 300 years.”  “There were more slaves in the world than ever, in spite of the fact that all nations had passed laws to ban slave labour.  Actually, the price had never been as low as it was now, just $90 on average.  It was even possible to get a good slave from Mali for only $40. . . . In the 1880s, during the transatlantic slave trade to America, a slave cost $1,000.  In today’s currency, that was equal to $38,000, which meant that now 4,000 slaves could be bought for the price of only one back then.” 

I had some issues with the plot.  Ally discovers the nature of Patrick’s investigation and easily identifies the main villains, though she is a set designer, not a detective or investigative journalist.  Ally’s language comprehension is confusing:  she claims not to understand much French and when she tries to “conjure up some words in French,” she can’t.  But then her knowledge of French “resurfaced like a repressed memory”?  She can speak Spanish but not read it?  I also take exception to the ending which would be more appropriate in an action movie. 

I preferred Alsterdal’s police procedural to this standalone, though the latter has motivated me to research further into the plight of migrants in Europe.