The Shadow Girls - Henning Mankell

First let me start off with my reaction:

Ahem.  Now that's off my chest.  Let us move along to the review.

The book opens with a young Nigerian woman who has survived a shipwreck and is herded into a refugee camp.  Out of desperation to escape, she (unsuccessfully) impersonates a Kurd and gives herself the English name, "Tea-Bag" after spotting the tin sitting on the official's desk.  I loved her confidence and gutsiness despite her circumstances.  

It goes downhill from there.

Cut scene to Jesper Humlin - a poet returning from his vacation  research trip and is back in Sweden to enjoy reality and deal with a whole crew of annoying "friends and family".  I got so annoyed by his whining and helplessness from being tugged around his headstrong and demanding relationships.  There's his demanding mother Märta, who guilt-trips him about not talking to her enough even though he has dinner with her every week without fail.  There's his angry girlfriend Andrea who wants a kid a.s.a.p. and pulls out the "omg that's it, I'm breaking up with you this time.  For serious.  I mean it!  Really, I mean it!"-card every other phone call.  There's his pushy editor who wants him to forget poetry and hop on the crime-fiction bandwagon (a shout-out to Mankell's Wallander Series), who actually goes ahead to push a false tagline, press releases, and title because he's such a "good friend" and is looking out for him.  Finally, there is his friend Tørnblom and three illegal immigrant girls that pull him into doing a writing seminar to teach them how to express themselves and write stories about how they came to Sweden. (leading you back to Tea-Bag's story)

Despite the fact that I hated Jesper the whiny, tired, self-important sucker, the plot sounded very promising and I continued reading because it was the "shadow girls" that got to me.  I was hoping this would one of those inspirational books where the stuck-up protagonist is absolutely detestable in the beginning but then redeems himself when his eyes are opened to the plight of these girls.  NOPE.  The pathetic, manipulated man turns around and becomes the manipulator, hearing their stories and attempting to poach them for his own writing material.  He calls them "shadow girls" and through his selfish actions, forces them to flee back into the shadows.  I turned the last page in disbelief, hoping that there was some redeeming quality to this sad, sad man.  My hopes were dashed.

Here's the cover so you can flee if you recognize it.  Save yourselves!!