The Bat by Jo Nesbo (2014) Thorndike Press

The Bat refers to an Australian Aboriginal depiction of death.  A Norwegian police detective, Harry Holë, pronounced ‘Holy’,  is dispatched to Australia to investigate the murder of a starlet from his country.  This is his first visit down under and he meets new people, including an aboriginal policeman and a bartender from Sweden.  He’s attracted to her and it leads to the romantic interest in the story.  But people tend to have secrets.  His friend the policeman used to be a boxer, and he knows things he won’t tell other people.  His main suspect is a drug dealer, who won’t tell anyone anything useful.  Even the locals are keeping secrets.

Harry has his own secrets that threaten to take him off the rails.  But the real question is whether Harry will find the killer before the killer finds and kills Harry.