STIEG LARSSON died shortly after delivering The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo to his publisher; it won huge sales in Scandinavia where they appreciate crime fiction, and did well in Germany and France. The ballyhoo is fully justified. I usually resist long crime novels, but at over 500 pages, this hardly sagged.

Mikael Blomqvist, a Swedish journalist, is asked by Henrik Vanger, the elderly scion of a wealthy but dysfunctional family, to look into the disappearance of his 16-year-old niece Harriet 40 years before. On her birthday ever since, Henrik has received an unusual flower from various parts of the world, sent, he believes, by the killer. Blomqvist is certain that he can discover nothing new, but his delving into family secrets produces shocking results. He teams up with a damaged young woman - with the tattoo - who has a genius for hacking into computers. The unlikely couple shed disturbing light on four decades of mystery. The novel scores on every front - characters, story, atmosphere and the translation, by Steven T. Murray. And Tattoo is the first of a trilogy; Larsson handed in all three at the same time.

You will now have to remember two very good Icelandic crime writers. Arnaldur Indridason, who made his mark with his Inspector Erlander a few years ago, is now joined by Yrsa Sigurdardottir, a well-known children's author. The heroine of Last Rituals (translated by Bernard Scudder), Thora Gudmundsdottir, is a struggling Reykjavik attorney, divorced with two children.

She is approached by the parents of Harald, a German student who has been murdered in Iceland, and had his eyes gouged out. The police have arrested his friend, but the parents don't believe he is the right man. Thora is hired to investigate, together with a German former policeman. The clues appear to lie in Harald's obsession with witchcraft, and his dabbling in behaviour not for the squeamish. This is entertaining, well plotted and cleverly combines the historical and macabre with Thora's life, even if she is a little underpowered for the lead role.

British readers are familiar with Italian crime writers such as Andrea Camilleri, Gianrico Carofiglio and Carlo Lucarelli. Crimini: The Bitter Lemon Book of Italian Crime Fiction, edited by Giancarlo De Cataldo, shows that they are not the only names in the country's recent resurgence. The nine stories here, loosely labelled “Italian Noir”, demonstrate an impressive range of style and content. I was particularly taken by Massimo Carlotto and Marcello Fois, but all of them are well worth reading.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson
Quercus, £14.99

Last Rituals by Yrsa Sigurdardottir, translated by Bernard Scudder
Hodder, £19.99

Crimini: The Bitter Lemon Book of Crime Fiction edited by Gianarlo De Cataldo
Bitter Lemon, £8.99

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