The Fourth Man, by KO Dahl
Filed under: book review, crime book, KO Dahl, Norwegian writer
The Fourth Man is actually the fifth novel about inspectors Gunnarstranda and Frolich (Frølich) by K O Dahl. It is in some ways more similar to American crime novels than for instance those by Scandinavian authors like Karin Fossum, Karin Alvtegen, Jo Nesbo, Ake Edwardson or Henning Mankell. K O Dahl writes in a hard-boiled noir style that is at the same time lean, and reminds me more of Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler. There is, however, considerable psychological depth, and more so than what is explicit in Hammett and Chandler. This is one of KO Dahl’s best novels.
By the time Frolich learns that Elisabeth is the sister of a known local gang-member, Johnny Faremo, it is already too late. And then Johnny is implicated in a crime, a security guard is attacked and killed. But Elisabeth gives her brother and his gang an alibi and Frolich’s name is mentioned. Then Elisabeth disappears. Now Frolich is plunged into both an emotional tempest as well as a complex investigation. He is forced to rethink their relationship. Were things as they seemed?
Frolich is asked to take some time off. And his boss Gunnarstranda is upset and believes Frank has been played from the very beginning. And as the body count increases, Frolich begins his own unofficial investigation.
Complex, dark and tragic, The Fourth Man is a tale of revenge and erotic obsession, where love lures a good cop to walk on the wild side. This is classical crime noir in a modern setting. It has it all: cynical strippers, tough-talking gangsters, corrupt businessmen, mixed identities and a bona fide femme fatale. Dahl’s language is, as one critic put it “spiced with small poetic observations … of remarkably high quality.” The author himself says that this is his project, to “combine the genre literature with a little poetry and literary storytelling.” The Fourth Man proves that Dahl is able to do this. I enjoyed this book very much, and recommend it. A great read for lovers of good, tough, noir crime fiction!
and 
, or from amazon US: A Blessed Child, by Linn Ullmann
Filed under: book review, Fiction, Linn Ullman, Norwegian writer
In this book, Norwegian author Linn Ullmann explores themes like guilt, reconciliation, and the passing of years on memory in a novel that is powerfully driven by raw sensuality and violence. It is a book that makes a strong impression.
The novel tells the tale of three sisters and their fragile relationship to their father.A Blessed Child too starts with Erika nervously driving through a snowstorm to the Swedish 
Over time, the three young girls enter into changing alliances with other summer guests. One of these is Ragnar, the boy who is always running and who in some strange way is attracted to Isak.
No one assumes responsibility for what happens that summer, and more than twenty five years are to pass before the sisters return to the island – this time to visit their old father.
A Blessed Child is a rich portrayal of the life-stories of three women, and also a fine portrait of a father – both merciless and tender. It’s a story of girls that behave bad! Very bad indeed. It’s structure is mosaic and very appropriate. Linn Ullmann is a terrific writer. Her novel’s great strengths are the brilliantly drawn characters and the dialogues. A Blessed Child is a great book!
“A deeply disturbing and powerful novel with parallels to William Golding’s Lord of the Flies … Ullmann’s pen offers a sober narrative, never too sentimental or obvious, keeps us enthralled with hints, pulls us into the core from many different angles … merciless and credible” – ALF KJETIL WALGERMO, VÅRT LAND (Norway)
Read more about Linn Ullmann as well as book reviews of her books. See also an interview with Linn Ullmann here!
and at 
.The Man in the Window, by K O Dahl
Filed under: book review, crime book, KO Dahl, Norwegian writer, recommendation
The Man in The Window is the third book (in the original Norwegian sequence) in K O Dahl‘s series about Frolich and Gunnarstranda.
Seventy-nine-year-old Reidar Folke Jespersen, who sells antiques in Oslo, is one day sitting in a restaurant, looking at his wife entering an apartment on the other side of the street, where her lover lives. He leaves the restaurant to meet his brothers. Next morning he is found murdered, sitting naked in a chair in the window of his antique shop.
The case is assigned to detective Gunnarstranda and his assistant, Frank Frolich. The clues are few and difficult to interpret. A red string is tied around his neck, and three crosses and a number – 195 – has been written across his chest. Some items from WWII are missing. Also, clearly, several people are quite pleased that Jespersen is dead.
The Man In The Window is an intricate and thrilling detective story about love, loyalty, guilt, desire for revenge and shadows from the past. These questions consume the investigation, just as they fill the private lives of the investigators. What they uncover is a country where victims, perpetrators and even police officers are haunted by the past, and are still trying to cope with the dark memories of the Nazi occupation of the country.
K O Dahl has a sharp eye for dialogues, he elaborates detailed portraits, he creates surprising relationships and he is excellent at creating tension and atmosphere. This book is one of his best, and highly recommended.
.Jo Nesbo about The Snowman – YouTube video
Filed under: About books, crime book, Harry Hole, Interview, Jo Nesbo, Norwegian writer, YouTube
Jo Nesbo talks about his most recent crime fiction book, The Snowman (see review).
. See also Gunnar’s Daughter, by Sigrid Undset
Filed under: book review, historical fiction, Nobel Prize Winner, Norwegian writer, recommendation, Sigrid Undset
(Translated by Arthur G. Chater.New : York: Knopf, 1936. New translation by Tiina Nanally.) (Norwegian title: Fortællingen om Viga-Ljot og Vigdis. Christiania (Oslo): Aschehoug, 1909.)
Set in Norway and Iceland at the beginning of the eleventh century, Gunnar’s Daughter is the story of the beautiful, spoiled Vigdis Gunnarsdatter, who is casually raped by the man she had wanted to love.
A woman of courage and intelligence, Vigdis is toughened by adversity. Alone she raises the child conceived in violence, repeatedly defending her autonomy in a world governed by men. Alone she also gradually rebuilds her life and restores her family’s honor, until an unrelenting social code propels her to take the action that again destroys her happiness.
More than a historical romance, Gunnar’s Daughter depicts characters driven by passion and vengefulness, themes as familiar in Undset’s own time – and in ours – as they were in the Saga Age. A strong, unsentimental book by Nobel Prize winner Sigrid Undset. Still very well worth reading!
To Siberia, by Per Petterson
Filed under: book review, Norwegian writer, Per Petterson, Prize winning novel
To Siberia is a beautifully written book about the life of a sixty year old Danish woman and her family. Per Petterson lets this woman – we don’t even learn
She tells, or thinks, about childhood in a Danish port town on the Jutland peninsula, about her grandfather, a farmer who hangs himself in a cowshed, and of the rest of her family – her mother who is a devout Christian, and her father. But most of the book focuses on memories of her older brother Jesper, to whom she had a close and special relationship – their joint memories as well as her longing for him.
Sistermine and Jesper do not get much love or affection from their mother and often silent father. They grow up together, sharing late night adventures and experiences. They grow to learn that “the world was far bigger than the town I lived in,” and they look forward to “my own great journey.” Jesper yearns to move to the warm climate of Morocco while Sistermine has her sights set on Siberia.
However, the German occupation shatters the future they have drawn up for themselves. Jesper, who is politically interested and has a leftist orientation, gets involved in the German resistance movement in Denmark. Eventually he, as many other Danes and Norwegians during World War II, runs to Sweden. Sistermine watches him depart on a boat.
After the war is over, she moves around in Scandinavia, seemingly looking for meaning in her life, and constantly longing for her older brother, who has gone to Morocco after the war. Sistermine will never see him again, and never gets to see Siberia either.
Like Out Stealing Horses, To Siberia is a sparely, beautifully written and at times poetic book. The story is interesting and touching. However, in my opinion, To Siberia is not quite as good as Out Stealing Horses (which was remarkable).
You can order Per Petterson’s To Siberia: A Novel
The Devil’s Star, by Jo Nesbo
Filed under: book review, Harry Hole, Jo Nesbo, Norwegian writer, Prize winning novel, recommendation
Jo Nesbo (Norwegian name Nesbø), author of the best-selling series featuring Detective Harry Hole, has won many prizes for his novels, including the Glass Key, 
The key character in Nesbo’s books, introduced in The Devil’s Star, is detective Harry Hole. Harry Hole is an angry, hard-drinking, near alcholic, and off-the-rails detective who wants to play the game by his own rules. He is not very likable, but still charming in his own way.
It’s a sweltering summer in Oslo when a young woman is found murdered in her flat. One finger has been cut off, and beneath her eyelid is a tiny red diamond in the shape of a five pointed star. Otherwise, clues are few and far between.
Detective Harry Hole is assigned to the case with Tom Waaler – a colleague the somewhat paranoid Harry suspects of running an arms smuggling gang and of having murdered his partner – and initially Harry Hole refuses to become involved. But he is already on notice to quit the force and is left with no choice but to drag himself out of his alcoholic stupor and go to work.
Five days later, a man reports his wife missing. When her severed finger is found wearing a ring mounted with the same star-shaped red diamond, it seems Oslo has a serial killer on its hands. The case in The Devil’s Star revolves around a riddle of fives: five points to the star, five fingers on the hand, and every fifth day a new victim to be counted. In his pursuit of the truth behind both mysteries, Harry Hole unwittingly finds himself on the run from the police and forced to make difficult decisions about his future as a detective.
The Devil’s Star is an exciting and entertaining book, a great crime novel by an exciting new author! The plot is superb, the action intriguing, inspector Harry Hole has plenty to deal with, and the story is told in a fascinating and appealing manner as well. This is the first book in a great series I suspect you will not want to miss out on!
You can read more about Jo Nesbo and his books at ScandinavianBooks.
Order Jo Nesbo’s The Devil’s Star
Don’t Look Back! – Karin Fossum
Filed under: crime book, Inspector Konrad Sejer, Karin Fossum, Norwegian writer, Prize winning novel
In a sleepy little village at the foot of a Norwegian mountain, a child — 6 year old Ragnhild — goes missing. It is a village where the children run in and out of one another’s 
houses and play unafraid in the streets. Yet the search for her reveals the naked body of the well-liked local schoolgirl. Why would anyone want to murder Annie Holland? The investigation of this question is in the hands of Inspector Konrad Sejer and his young colleague Jacob Skarre.
Karin Fossum is one of my favorite Norwegian crime writers. Karin Fossum was born November 6, 1954 in Sandefjord. She now lives in Oslo. Karin Fossum’s Inspector Sejer novels are masterfully constructed, psychologically convincing, and compulsively readable.
This is a wonderful book with great characters, and it is very carefully written. The dialogue is realistic. It is also a book that gives a strong sense of community and that makes you feel and know that, yeah, this is how is could really have happened in a small community in Norway. As well, the police work is interesting and well described. The book is highly recommended to anyone who likes police-procedural novels.
And, so that you know that this really is a high quality book, I should mention that Don’t Look Back! received The Riverton Prize and The Glass Key (for the best Nordic detective novel).
Read an excerpt of the book at the Hardcourt publishers’ site. We have more reviews of Karin Fossum’s books at ScandinavianBooks!
Aftenposten’s reviewer said the book “has hit the bull’s eye. It has scored a direct hit and is an exceptional top score! This is a dazzling writing in the crime genre”.
“Don’t Look Back! shows just how well Fossum deserves her continental fame.” — Sunday Times
You can order books by Karin Fossum
Pan, by Knut Hamsun
Filed under: book review, Fiction, Knut Hamsun, Nobel Prize Winner, Norwegian writer
I enjoy reading Knut Hamsun, the famous Norwegian Nobel Prize winner in Literature. He writes elegantly, lyrical, and beautiful, and I like his 
sense of humor as well.
Pan: From Lieutenant Thomas Glahn’s Papers (Penguin Twentieth-Century Classics)
Pan is a wonderful Knut Hamsun book. Otto Weineger claimed it was the most beautiful book ever written. In Pan, Hamsun is concerned with the beauty of nature and our relationship to it. His descriptions are beautiful. His mastery of language, and his very conscious use of it, is intruiging. He uses language to underscore what is happening. For instance, when Glahn is alone, his sentences are long, drawn out, but when he talks to women, his sentences are short, distinct, intense. In addition, the story in Pan is as beautiful as it is heartbreaking.
Pan, in my humbe opinion, is one of the most interesting books written by Hamsun, a true masterpiece. At the center of the book is the eternal battle of the sexes. The book is full of pure poetry and “lyric outbursts”. Pan is also, deservedly, one of the most widely known works by Knut Hamsun.
Read more about Knut Hamsun at Scandinavianbooks.com.
Dreamers, by Knut Hamsun
Filed under: book review, Fiction, Knut Hamsun, Nobel Prize Winner, Norwegian writer
Dreamers is a short and somewhat light 
novel by the Norwegian Nobel Prize winning author Knut Hamsun. Set in an isolated Norwegian fishing village, the novel is a romantic comedy, centering on Ove Rolandsen, who is an aspiring inventor.
Rolandsen is a schemer, a liar, and a not particularly effective womanizer. Rolandsen is engaged to the local parson’s housekeeper, yet he has eyes for both the local sexton’s daughter and for the daughter of Trader Mack, the town’s most prosperous businessman.
Rolandsen has invented a new process for manufacturing fish-glue, the commodity which is the main source of Trader Mack’s wealth; yet Rolandsen, who works as a telegraph operator, lacks sufficient funds to get his invention out into the world. Thus the tale becomes one of money and power, as well as, of course, of love and lust.
In Dreamers, Hamsun handles his plot with a light and assured touch, and the novel is charming. However, Dreamers 
Other interesting books by Knut Hamsun at amazon US include: Hunger
See also the bibliography of Knut Hamsun at Leserglede.com.
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