Karen’s Blog

Kennedy’s Brain by Henning Mankell

Released last September in English, this is a novel by the Swedish author Henning Mankell, famous for the Kurt Wallander mysteries. It is always interesting to me to read books from other perspectives than normal. It is a fascinating book, but very, very sad. I’d still recommend, though, as it lingers in your brain after you’ve finished the story, which is always a good sign.

The main character, Louise Cantor, is a Swedish archaeologist working on a dig in Argolis, Greece, has made a career putting together pieces of the past, often quite literally from shards of pottery and bone. Satisfied in her work, long-divorced and content with staying that way, her world is turned inside out when she, travelling for a conference back in Sweden, discovers the body of her 25-year-old only child, son Henrik, dead of no apparent cause in his apartment. The police rule it a suicide, but Louise is convinced it is not.

In trying to understand Henrik’s death, and his life, she begins reading papers in his apartment, and starts to try to piece together events, like her work in archeology has trained her to do. More and more layers of complexity appear, and she travels to Spain, and to Africa, retracing Henrik’s journeys and meeting people who knew him, trying to find answers. The title of the book comes from some of Henrik’s papers, concerning the disappearance of JFK’s brain after the autopsy, and the mystery surrounding it, which puzzles Louise, as she had no idea he had any interest in the American president. She even contacts her ex-husband, who intentionally disappeared years before, but kept in touch with their son.

The more Louise digs, the more complex, and sinister things get. The story involves AIDS, unethical medical experimentation and personal and political tragedies, the realities of life in rural and desperately poor Africa, and the growing suspicion that Henrik was murdered for the work he was doing that was about to combat some of the horrors he had seen. It is a sad book, beginning with a death, and more and more people die as Louise pursues her relentless quest to understand her only child’s death and life. It might be depressing in someone else’s hands, but Mankell keeps his main character interesting enough, and the plot just complicated enough to keep you guessing even beyond the last page. The people she encounters are also multi-layered and deeply drawn, and like Louise, you get the feeling you just don’t know who to believe or trust.

This is not a book for the squeamish, by the way. There is plenty of illness, disease, and blood to turn anyone’s stomach, and enough moral ambiguities to make anyone think. But I do recommend it, especially if you are a fan of mysteries and like figuring things out.