About

9781472120595I am a London-based native Dutch speaker who writes in English. I draw inspiration from cases that my father, a retired police detective, worked on in the Netherlands.

A Cold Death in Amsterdam is a smart and engaging police procedural about a Dutch detective struggling to come to terms with her past.

 

The Sunday Times, review by Joan Smith: ‘[Meerman’s] painstaking police work is undermined by emotional turmoil in a novel brilliantly evoking the isolation of a woman with an unbearable weight on her conscience’.

Sunday Express, review by Jake Kerridge: ‘The book succeeds as a portrait of both a city and, in its heroine, a delightfully dysfunctional personality.’

The Times,  review by Marcel Berlins: ‘An impressive debut… De Jager is as good on dodgy family relations as she is on police procedure.’

Irish Examiner, review, : ‘Anja de Jager’s debut novel is a tightly written, cleverly plotted whodunit that keeps the reader guessing almost to the last page.’

The Independent, review by Barry Forshaw: ‘de Jager manages to circumvent the overfamiliar. The evocation of a bitterly cold Amsterdam is worthy of Nicholas Freeling’s Van der Valk books.’

Irish Independent, review: ‘A promising debut novel with a very different background.’

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19 thoughts on “About

  1. I am so pleased to have discovered @ A Cold Day in Amsterdam’ and ‘met’ Lotte who is to me a real character because she reminds me of a real Lotte who I met in Holland in 1944 when I was serving on a Dutch tug. She was like your Lottte a stubborn and determined lady. I found the story a challenging.but fascinating read and at times extremely moving. I eagerly await more about this sensitive detective. (Maybe the story of Wendy ?)

  2. I am currently reading the latest book. I have read all of the Lottie Meerman series and thoroughly enjoyed them. The new one is no exception. Keep them coming Anja!

  3. Anya I’m listening to A Cold Death in Amsterdam on BorrowBox. Really enjoying it as Lotte is so credible, reminding me of my daughter who is now a detective. With a retired police inspector father. BorrowBox is often thin on titles but I’m lucky to have found this one first. Thank you!

  4. I love your Lotte Meerman books. I have all six and look forward to number 7. They are set in Amsterdam and brings back many memories of my happy childhood spent in that lovely city in the 1950’s. In one of your future books could you perhaps incorporate the Bos en Lommerweg area situate in Amsterdam West. I lived in the new housing development there and the Kolenkit Church became a distinctive land mark. We called it “the Wild West” as when we moved in the roads had not been finished.

  5. Just reading A Cold Case in Amsterdam Central. It’s a refreshing change these days to pick up a book that is well written.

    • Anja, I have only recently discovered Lotte Meerman having bought Death on the Canal in a Charity Shop!! Then I was hooked and have bought the other 5 and read avidly , in order. Halfway through Death at the Orange Locks as I text.
      A slightly flawed character, aren’t we all,who is overly self critical is Lotte.
      Can’t wait to see what she will be solving next.

      David

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