Harry Hole Books in Order
Harry Hole is an Oslo homicide detective with a drinking problem, a talent for catching serial killers and a habit of wrecking everything good in his life. The series starts with cases in Sydney and Bangkok, then settles in Oslo, where Harry clashes with his bosses, protects the few people he trusts and keeps getting pulled back to the cases nobody else can crack.
Nesbø writes dark, twisty crime novels with big set pieces, misdirection and violence that can be hard to read. The books are bleak but often wryly funny, and the long-running story of Harry, Rakel and Oleg ties the series together.
It suits readers of Scandinavian noir and anyone who likes damaged detectives and plots built around surprise. Read in original order, since later books lean heavily on earlier events, even though the English translations first appeared in a different order.
The Bat
Harry Hole, a talented but hard-drinking Oslo detective, is sent to Sydney after a young Norwegian woman is found murdered there. Officially he is only there to observe. Working with Andrew Kensington, an Aboriginal detective, he finds the case tied to other deaths and to a history Australia would rather not discuss. It is rougher than the later books and reached English readers late, but it sets up who Harry is and what he carries.
Published: 1997
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Cockroaches
Norway's ambassador to Thailand is found stabbed in a Bangkok motel used by prostitutes, and Oslo sends Harry to sort it out quietly before the press hears about it. Fighting his drinking, Harry works through a city of heat, traffic and corruption and finds that plenty of people want the investigation to fail. Like The Bat, it is an early, self-contained story that was translated into English only after the later books were hits.
Published: 1998
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The Redbreast
After an embarrassing incident during a U.S. presidential visit, Harry is moved sideways into the security service, where he picks up the trail of a rare rifle smuggled into Norway. The case leads back to Norwegians who fought for Germany on the Eastern Front in World War II and to old wounds that never healed. Harry also meets Rakel Fauke here. Many readers start with this book, which opens an arc that runs through the next two.
Published: 2000
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Nemesis
A bank robber in Oslo shoots a cashier dead in front of the cameras, and Harry joins the hunt for a man who seems to know exactly how the police work. At the same time Harry has dinner with an old girlfriend, wakes up with no memory of the night, and learns she has been found dead. Suddenly he has reasons to fear for himself. The book carries on threads from The Redbreast, so read that first.
Published: 2002
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The Devil's Star
Oslo is sweltering through a heat wave when a young woman is found shot, with a finger cut off and a tiny red star-shaped diamond hidden on her body. More killings follow the same pattern. Harry, drinking hard and close to being fired, is forced to work alongside a colleague he deeply distrusts. This closes the arc that began in The Redbreast, and it was the first Harry Hole novel published in English.
Published: 2003
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The Redeemer
During the Christmas season, a Salvation Army officer is shot dead at a street concert in central Oslo by a professional killer from Croatia. Harry soon suspects the gunman hit the wrong man, and the killer, stuck in a snowbound city, keeps trying to finish the job. The story moves between Harry, the hitman and the Salvation Army family at its center. A wintry, tightly plotted thriller with more heart than most books in the series.
Published: 2005
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The Snowman
On the night of the first snowfall, a mother disappears from her Oslo home, and her young son finds a snowman in the garden wearing her scarf. Harry links the case to a string of disappearances that follow the same pattern and realizes he is facing something Norway has rarely seen: a serial killer. He is joined by a new detective from Bergen, Katrine Bratt. Often called the best book in the series, and the basis for the 2017 film.
Published: 2007
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The Leopard
Harry has fled to Hong Kong after the events of The Snowman and is losing himself in drink and opium. Detective Kaja Solness is sent to bring him home, because two women have been murdered in Oslo in an especially cruel way and the police need his experience. The case spreads across Norway and beyond while the Oslo police and the national crime unit, Kripos, fight over who owns it. Long and dark; read The Snowman first.
Published: 2009
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Phantom
Harry comes back to Oslo from Hong Kong for one reason: Oleg, the boy he helped raise, has been arrested for killing a young drug dealer. Harry is no longer a cop, but he starts his own investigation into the city's heroin trade and a new synthetic drug that is taking over the streets. Parts of the story are told by the murder victim. It is a very personal book for Harry and works best if you have followed the series so far.
Published: 2011
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Police
Someone is killing Oslo police officers at the scenes of old unsolved murders they once worked, luring each one back to the place where the case went cold. The homicide unit is short of experienced detectives, and the ones left badly need the help of the man who knows these cases best. Harry's part in the story is best discovered as you read. This follows straight on from Phantom, so read that one first.
Published: 2013
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The Thirst
Harry has stepped back from police work, teaches at the Police College and finally has a settled home life. Then women who used a dating app start turning up dead, killed with a set of iron teeth, and the evidence points to a killer Harry failed to catch years before. Pressured to come back, he takes the case and finds the old hunger for the hunt is still there. It arrived after a four-year break in the series.
Published: 2017
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Knife
Harry is back with the Oslo police but stuck on cold cases, drinking again and living alone. Svein Finne, a violent man Harry once put away, is out of prison and seems to be returning to his old crimes. Then Harry wakes up after a blackout with blood on his hands and no memory of the night before, and a murder lands closer to him than any case ever has. A raw, painful entry; read The Thirst first.
Published: 2019
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Killing Moon
Harry is drinking himself to death in Los Angeles when he befriends an elderly former actress who owes money to dangerous people. To help her, he accepts an offer back in Oslo: a wealthy man suspected in the disappearance of two young women will pay Harry to find the real killer. With no badge, Harry pulls together an unofficial team of old allies and outcasts. A fresh start for the character after the events of Knife.
Published: 2022
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