by Gunnar Staalesen (Translated by: Don Bartlett)
SYNOPSIS
As Bergen PI Varg Veum investigates two different cases, it becomes clear that they are uncannily similar to harrowing events that took place thirty-six years earlier… A gripping instalment of the award-winning Varg Veum series, by one of the fathers of Nordic Noir.
Bergen Private Investigator Varg Veum is perplexed when two wildly different cases cross his desk at the same time. A lawyer, anxious to protect her privacy, asks Varg to find her sister, who has disappeared with her husband, seemingly without trace, while a ship carrying unknown cargo is heading towards the Norwegian coast, and the authorities need answers.
Varg immerses himself in the investigations, and it becomes clear that the two cases are linked, and have unsettling – and increasingly uncanny – similarities to events that took place thirty-six years earlier, when a woman and her saxophonist lover drove their car off a cliff, in an apparent double suicide.
As Varg is drawn into a complex case involving star-crossed lovers, toxic waste and illegal immigrants, history seems determined to repeat itself in perfect detail … and at terrifying cost...
REVIEW
Varg Veum is contacted by two separate clients to look into two unrelated issues - the first is a couple who have recently disappeared from their home with no warning given to family or friends, and the second is regarding a cargo ship headed for Norway. However, as the same names and places begin to crop up in his investigations, Varg realises that this is more than just a coincidence, and in a strange twist, history seems to be repeating itself with dangerous consequences.
Because the book is set in the 1990s, Varg Veum doesn’t have all of the technology that we have available to us now. He has to rely on more ‘old school’ methods of detection and that gives the story a slightly nostalgic feel, not quite reminiscent of the classic golden age detective novels but somewhere in between which makes it stand out from other stories in this genre. The flashback scenes were also a really effective way of bring the historic and present day cases together, as well as working to gradually piece together the story.
Every time I read from the Varg Veum series I always think the same thing - the writing is just exquisite. Whether this is the original text, the beautiful translation or a combination of the two, you don’t even realise you’re reading most of the time. I was just so totally transported to this world and I was more than happy to stay there as Varg worked the case.
If you haven’t read any of the books from this series I would highly recommend them. Unlike many Nordic Noir novels these aren’t the darkest cases, and Varg himself brings a lot of humour to the story. I think that the closest books to this series in terms of style and feel are the Wallander books by Henning Mankell, so if you're a fan of these types of detective investigations I would definitely start to work through the extensive back catalogue.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR & TRANSLATOR
One of the fathers of Nordic Noir, Gunnar Staalesen was born in Bergen, Norway, in 1947. He made his debut at the age of twenty-two with Seasons of Innocence and in 1977 he published the first book in the Varg Veum series. He is the author of over twenty titles, which have been published in twenty-four countries and sold over four million copies. Twelve film adaptations of his Varg Veum crime novels have appeared since 2007, starring the popular Norwegian actor Trond Espen Seim. Staalesen has won three Golden Pistols (including the Prize of Honour) and Where Roses Never Die won the 2017 Petrona Award for Nordic Crime Fiction, and Big Sister was shortlisted in 2019. He lives with his wife in Bergen.
Don Bartlett completed an MA in Literary Translation at the University of East Anglia in 2000 and has since worked with a wide variety of Danish and Norwegian authors, including Jo Nesbø and Gunnar Staalesen’s Varg Veum series: We Shall Inherit the Wind, Wolves in the Dark and the Petrona award-winning Where Roses Never Die. He also translated Faithless, the previous book in Kjell Ola Dahl’s Oslo Detective series for Orenda Books. He lives with his family in a village in Norfolk.
Thanks to Anne Cater - @RandomTTours, Gunnar Staalesen and Orenda Books - @OrendaBooks for the opportunity to read and review
Fiction: Detective Story / Nordic Noir / Crime Thriller
Publisher: Orenda Books
ISBN: 978-1914585944
Pages: 300pp
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