Martin Beck: Roseanna

Steven Mackintosh stars as Martin Beck, with Neil Pearson as Lennart Kollberg, in this BBC Radio 4 dramatisation of Roseanna. The Martin Beck books are widely acknowledged as some of the most influential detective novels ever written. Written by Swedish husband and wife team Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo, the series set a gold standard for all subsequent Scandanavian crime fiction. Before Kurt Wallander or Harry Hole, Beck was the original flawed policeman, working alongside his colleagues to uncover the cruelty and injustice lurking beneath the surface of Sweden's seemingly liberal, democratic society. In Roseanna, adapted from the first book in the series, the body of an attractive young woman is dredged from the Gota Canal. Beck and his team have to narrow down the list of suspects from 85 cruise passengers, in an investigation that ends with a risky and frightening sting... Translated by Lois Roth and dramatised by Jennifer Howarth.