cover image Bubble

Bubble

Anders de la Motte, trans. from the Swedish by Neil Smith. Atria/Emily Bestler, $16 trade paper (480p) ISBN 978-1-4767-1294-9

Henrik "HP" Pettersson's a gamer%E2%80%94in every sense of the word%E2%80%94which might explain why, instead of kicking back and savoring his victory over the bad guys in Buzz, Swedish author de la Motte's second entry in his crime trilogy, HP must now try to destroy the Internet scheme known as "the Game" once and for all and free both himself and his sister, Rebecca. But that's going to be a Herculean task, even for someone with HP's paranoid genius, because the evil Game Master has so many weapons in his arsenal%E2%80%94including Becca herself, who has just been made head of security at the Game-linked IT behemoth PayTag. The setup of several intriguing storylines (including one suggesting that the late Petersson paterfamilias may having been leading a double or triple life) makes for a sluggish start, but this third installment eventually hits bullet-train speed as it hurtles toward a twisty finale, interwoven with a Swedish royal wedding. Agent: Federico Ambrosini, Salomonsson Agency (Sweden). (Feb.)