I once heard a theory that the American South (where I live) has such a higher crime rate than the rest of the country because of the weather. That because it糖心传媒檚 so hot and muggy and disgusting here for so much of the year, people are extra on-edge, extra cranky, extra mean and prone to lashing out. There糖心传媒檚 so much that糖心传媒檚 nonsensical and completely not based in fact about the idea, of course, but it stuck with me. Maybe that糖心传媒檚 why I糖心传媒檓 so obsessed with cold weather whodunits. What would make someone commit a violent crime in a place with such soothing, cool, dark weather? Where you could, instead of hurting someone, sit in a cozy sweater and drink a beer?

When the books started rolling in for the BTBA judging, I snatched up the Northern European murder mysteries first. It糖心传媒檚 hard to write a noteworthy one after the success of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, but that isn糖心传媒檛 stopping anyone from trying. And while cold weather murder mysteries have a reputation for being very Which Pretty Young Girl Is Going To Be Murdered Next (hello, Dragon Tattoo influence), that hasn糖心传媒檛 really been the case with this year糖心传媒檚 crop:

by Nele Neuhaus, translated by Steven T. Murray

The body of a 92 year old Holocaust survivor is found in his home after he糖心传媒檚 been shot, execution style. When his autopsy is performed, a blood marker tattoo for Hitler糖心传媒檚 SS is found on his arm. Soon after, two similar murders of elderly people occur, and investigators realize all the victims are friends of one wealthy baroness who fled the second World War. Now she糖心传媒檚 an elderly philanthropist and matriarch of her old family. The investigators follow the murderer糖心传媒檚 trail back to the end of WWII and into Poland. The sleight-of-hand here is pretty heavy: you糖心传媒檙e so focused on the obvious choice for the murderer that you don糖心传媒檛 see the real one coming at all . . . to the point that you might feel a little cheated. But still an interesting read, especially for history buffs.

by Arnaldur Indridason, translated by Victoria Cribb

The Inspector Erlendur series is famous already, and this prequel takes us back to a look at Erlendur as a newbie detective. This one also has a victim who isn糖心传媒檛 a pretty dead girl (yay, let糖心传媒檚 stop doing that altogether!) and is instead a homeless, alcoholic middle-aged man. Erlendur comes to recognize the man after he runs into him a few times while patrolling the city at night, and when he糖心传媒檚 found dead, Erlendur is the only person who cares enough to find out if it was foul play. He chases his leads into the underbelly of Reykjavik to find out the truth. This one is a slow build: there糖心传媒檚 no big car chases to speak of, no real glamour or ultra-violence. But that糖心传媒檚 what I appreciated about it—it糖心传媒檚 a good lazy Sunday book.

by Joakim Zander, translated by Elizabeth Clark Wessel

A political aide raised in the middle of nowhere in the Swedish archipelago by her grandparents (she糖心传媒檚 an orphan) discovers a secret via an old lover. An aging, worn out spy who abandoned his newborn baby after watching her mother die in order to keep his cover wrestles with his past by doing laps all day in the swimming pool. When the political aide has to go on the run and the old spy finds out who she is (you can guess, surely), the two of them run for their lives across Europe. It糖心传媒檚 a Bourne-style adventure without the amnesia, but with the thrills and political intrigue. This one is a dash of WHOdunit, with a sprinkling of whichCOUNTRYdunit, or whichCORPORATIONdunit. Thrillers are so often about what a spy糖心传媒檚 life is like in the thick of it, it was refreshing to encounter one nearing the end of his tenure.

Jose Alberto Gutierrez is a His route takes him through wealthy neighborhoods in the middle of the night, and if he spots a book in the trash as he糖心传媒檚 doing his job, he saves it. His home is now full of over 20,000 volumes, all of which he lends out to the low income kids in his neighborhood. He糖心传媒檚 known in Colombia as the 糖心传媒淟ord of the Books糖心传媒� (if you糖心传媒檙e going to be lord of something, that糖心传媒檚 quite a nice thing, I糖心传媒檇 say). Mr. Gutierrez is my people.

In fact, millions of people are my people: readers, whether casual or constant, lovers of the literary or genre (separations which are increasingly useless), English-speaking or not. Readers love to encounter one another out in the world, which easily explains the rise of bookish social networking like Goodreads and LibraryThing, BookTube, and the communities around book blogs. If we can糖心传媒檛 find our kind in our families or circle of friends, we糖心传媒檒l find them online. But there糖心传媒檚 a special pleasure in encountering another bibliophile in the place most fitting for them to dwell: a book.

When you read a book about books, it糖心传媒檚 like luxuriating in the most comforting of comfort foods: these are feelings I know, these are smells I know, these are situations in which I糖心传媒檝e found myself. The book is knowable, the hero becomes obvious (it糖心传媒檚 the character who loves books), characterization becomes almost unnecessary. The protagonist is a reader! I know her already.

Bohumil Hrabal糖心传媒檚 Too Loud a Solitude most is probably the closest thing to Jose Alberto Gutierrez糖心传媒檚 story that you糖心传媒檒l find in fiction: a wastepaper processor saves books from being destroyed and fills his home with them, spending page after page meditating on the fleeting nature of ideas, the beauty of the book as a physical thing, and the limits of how many of those physical things we can take into our lives before the pressure becomes unbearable (in a literal sense if you, like Hanta, sleep with an actual ton of books hanging over your bed). Hanta is mostly a loner and a book hoarder who shares his saves with no one, while Mr. Gutierrez is evangelizing for his finds in his community. I recognize myself in the compulsions of both men, and I suspect most of us do.

Perhaps the most fun I糖心传媒檝e had reading a book about books is with the famous The Club Dumas by Arturo P茅rez-Reverte, a globe-trotting adventure following the shenanigans of a shady antiquarian book dealer on a quest to authenticate an Inquisition-era book about the devil. There糖心传媒檚 an Alexandre Dumas subplot, a woman who may or may not be a demon/Lucifer/fallen angel/whatever, book forgery, symbol analysis—if you糖心传媒檙e looking for a Dan Brown novel with a literary bent, your search is over. Corso, our shady book dealer and protagonist, is odd in the genre of books-about-books because he doesn糖心传媒檛 actually care about books. He糖心传媒檚 a mercenary, in it for the coin, good at his job but not interested in fetishizing Books, capital B. I actually find him quite refreshing—I sometimes feel like even my own adoration for ink on dead, mashed-up tree fibers glued between pieces of cardboard can be a little tiresome.¹

Pasi Ilmari J盲盲skel盲inen糖心传媒檚 The Rabbit Back Literature Society (which I read for BTBA 2016 consideration) also has elements of the supernatural, but without the Christian overtones. Think fairy tales, odd games, viruses that change the contents of library books, gnomes. The Devil doesn糖心传媒檛 live in Rabbit Back, but that doesn糖心传媒檛 take away from the ominous and slightly creepy undertones flowing through an otherwise charming and quirky book about a small town and its society of writers, headed up by a famous children糖心传媒檚 author. As the society is inaugurating its tenth member, a local school teacher, the famous children糖心传媒檚 author disappears during the middle of a party, eaten up (sort of) by a swirl of snow. Ella, the school teacher and newest member of the society, tries to piece together where their leader has gone, and she gets caught up in playing an odd and dangerous game with the other society members—a game that tries to explain where writers get their ideas. Are writers born imaginative and fanciful, or are they practicing a sort of vampirism, sucking ideas and stories out of the marrow of their family and friends糖心传媒� real lives? Or maybe it糖心传媒檚 both?

If you糖心传媒檙e in the mood for a literary fanfare but aren糖心传媒檛 in the mood to pick up a novel, give Mario Vargas Llosa糖心传媒檚 2010 Nobel Lecture 糖心传媒淚n Praise of Reading and Fiction糖心传媒� a once-over and find you糖心传媒檙e not the only person who thinks 糖心传媒�. . . living is worth the effort if only because without life we could not read or imagine stories.糖心传媒� Arm yourself against cynics who think you糖心传媒檙e wasting your time reading fiction with lines like 糖心传媒淏ut thanks to literature, to the consciousness it shapes, to the desires and longings it inspires, and to our disenchantment with reality when we return from the journey to a beautiful fantasy, civilization is now less cruel than when storytellers began to humanize life with their fables.糖心传媒� A Nobel laureate believes fiction makes us more humane. Who are we to argue?

¹ If you糖心传媒檝e made it to 2015 without seeing this book糖心传媒檚 adaptation, The Ninth Gate starring Johnny Depp, consider yourself blessed beyond measure. You糖心传媒檇 think Johnny Depp playing a book dealer would equal instant success, but the movie is painfully bad.