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Series: Pensionärsligan #3
Author: Catharina Ingelman-Sundberg
Genre: Crime, Mystery
First published 2016
Book description: In the third hilarious, unforgettable installment in internationally bestselling author Catharina Ingelman-Sundberg’s League of Pensioners series, Martha and the League’s latest escapade has them headed for the French Riviera in what is sure to be the most daring caper of the summer.
Martha and her friends are sitting comfortably in Sweden… a little too comfortably. Determined to do more for their fellow pensioners—and jazz things up for themselves—they’re up to their usual antics: bank robberies, money laundering, and figuring out how to disappear in a garbage-truck-cum-getaway-car. They have their sights sets on building a resort village for seniors, but that’s going to take money. Lots of money.
While stalking their millionaire neighbor, Carl, on Facebook, Anna-Gretta scrolls through his photos—all of them featuring luxury yachts on the Riviera—and an idea comes to her on how to solve the League’s cash problem. When she shares the hare-brained scheme with the others, they’re all aboard.
Their plan to cheat billionaires out of their luxury yachts in the south of France’s sun-bleached Saint-Tropez soon turns into the heist of their lives with the police hot on their heels—as well as a couple of ruthless ex-cons. Now this wily group of walker-equipped conspirators are hell-bent on accomplishing their dangerous mission—no matter the consequences
Review:
Once again the author succeeds in writing a breathtaking combination of a crime story and comedy. I almost laughed out loud several times and smiled more times than I could count, again as I was listening to the book while at work, I gave the gist of it to my coworkers, everyone agrees that the premise is so promising. Ingelman-Sundberg did a superb job of creating caring and tax-paying criminals in "The Little Old Lady Who Broke All the Rules". The fact that their plans seem to always fail but they end up working by divine intervention; they seem to have a huge strike of luck through their whole criminal life.
Even though it's a fictitious scenario, it's really funny and interesting how they worked each different robbery. Martha was the instigator of all the robberies and she showed how well she put them together. It was hilarious how she's using their criminal plans and the wish to continue to donate to all the elderly, to museums, and to healthcare workers as an excuse to extend a marriage she does not really want to happen. I was surprised that we had romance and even more that we had miscommunication as a couple, we would assume that because they are older they could have learned that in order to make a relationship succeed open communication would be the best tactic, but no. they had issues that could have been avoided if only they had an honest talk between the two of them. Older is not always wiser in matters of the heart it seems. It gave a very realistic touch to the story.
It was funny that they got caught in their own trap when they rented the barge for a restaurant. And then they learned that the city owned the barge. It was pretty hilarious when Oleg ran into all the groups of retirees when he went to tie up his newly bought ship and found these people with tickets to his ship. He definitely got a big surprise, it was a nice smack in the face, well deserved too as he was very demeaning towards the pensioners simply because they do not fit his aesthetic standard of beauty anymore. As usual, the interactions with middle-aged people are used to provide social commentary on how discriminatory society as a whole is towards elders. It does enrage me to see them, especially on how harsh it is towards women, it's used as an insult to age.
The other thing that was ironic was that Anna-Greta finally fell in love with Blomberg who was a retired ex-cop who knew IT and saved the day with the Russian's bank account. Their luck seems to stay even when the one determined detective to catch the League of Pensioners becomes involved and now he will probably be biased in case he finds the proof he seeks against the old people. And he was the one not to squeal on the League of Pensioners but joined them. It was a fun read, to say the least, and I would recommend this book to anyone wanting to cheer up.
This was used for the challenges:
Around the world: The author is from Sweden
Translated work
Finish series
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