Oskar lives with his mum in a high rise building in the western suburbs of Stockholm. It's the early eighties and he likes listening to Kiss on his Walkman, solving puzzles—including the Rubik's cube—and pasting grisly murder stories from the newspaper into his scrapbook. A victim of bullying, Oskar doesn't have many school friends, but is interested in the strange new neighbour next door. Eli introduces herself but she's a little strange—she smells bad, doesn't feel the cold at all, even in November, and from time to time her hair has a lot of grey.
Soon after Eli's move to Blackeberg a child's body is found hanging from a tree. The media think a serial killer is wreaking havoc in the town and affecting everyone's lives, but they're wrong—it's a vampire.
This extraordinary and powerful novel is part horror, part comedy and mostly love story. A moving, affectionate and, at times, grisly portrait of the agony of growing up and finding love, Let the Right One In may be the most satisfying novel of the year.
