The Fifth Woman

About “The Fifth Woman”

In an African convent, four nuns and an unidentified fifth woman are murdered, with the death of the unknown woman hidden by local police. A year later in Sweden, Inspector Kurt Wallander investigates two new murders. Holger Eriksson, a retired car dealer and bird watcher, is found impaled on sharpened bamboo poles, and a missing florist is discovered strangled and tied to a tree. Wallander has only a skull, a diary, and a photo of three men as clues. His investigation leads him to connect these murders with the unsolved death of the fifth woman in Africa. The case challenges Wallander’s strength and patience as he works to uncover the hidden links between the crimes. This is a 1996 novel by Henning Mankell.