Firewall by Henning Mankell

The scope of this one is no less than the destruction of the world-wide banking and financial network, with the intent of bringing down the entire system and the economies of the entire industrialized world. The principal criminals and their intentions are not really hidden from the reader - the question is whether or not Wallander can put the pieces together in time.

There is a running focus on young people - as victims, as criminals, as pawns, as citizens of a drastically changed world - including one particularly loathesome little sociopath who nearly brings down Wallander's career.

The entire picture is muddied by crimes that seem to be related, but may be coincidental - or may have been used by the criminal masterminds specifically to confuse the issue. As the title implies the setting for the crime is primarily in cyberspace and is heavily protected. Wallander brings in a private consultant - in the person of a teenage boy who has just served a short jail term for successfully hacking the Pentagon's protected network.

We also find the perpetually depressed Wallander the victim of a sneak attack by one of his own troops who starts carrying slanted and completely false complaints to the lady chief of police. Wallander also, in a moment of weakness, takes daughter Linda's advice and registers with a dating bureau with disastrous results.

In the end, Wallander metaphorically attacks the psychological "firewall" that is keeping him from getting on with his life.