It was lovely to be invited on the BLOG TOUR for WINTERKILL (thank you Anne!) and the atmospheric book cover design really caught my eye too; the bleak landscape looks a perfect setting for this latest book in the NORDIC NOIR Dark Iceland crime series, published by the fabulous ORENDA BOOKS. Please keep scrolling for lots of book information and chat…

The Book Blurb

When the body of a nineteen-year-old girl is found on the main street of Siglufjörður, Police Inspector Ari Thór battles a violent Icelandic storm in an increasingly dangerous hunt for her killer … The chilling, claustrophobic finale to the international bestselling Dark Iceland series.

Easter weekend is approaching, and snow is gently falling in Siglufjörður, the northernmost town in Iceland, as crowds of tourists arrive to visit the majestic ski slopes.

Ari Thór Arason is now a police inspector, but he’s separated from his girlfriend, who lives in Sweden with their three-year-old son. A family reunion is planned for the holiday, but a violent blizzard is threatening and there is an unsettling chill in the air.

Three days before Easter, a nineteen-year-old local girl falls to her death from the balcony of a house on the main street. A perplexing entry in her diary suggests that this may not be an accident, and when an old man in a local nursing home writes ‘She was murdered’ again and again on the wall of his room, there is every suggestion that something more sinister lies at the heart of her death…

As the extreme weather closes in, cutting the power and access to Siglufjörður, Ari Thór must piece together the puzzle to reveal a horrible truth … one that will leave no one unscathed.

Chilling, claustrophobic and disturbing, Winterkill marks the startling conclusion to the million-copy bestselling Dark Iceland series and cements Ragnar Jónasson as one of the most exciting authors in crime fiction.

The Blog Tour

My thoughts…

Firstly, I need to admit that this is my first time reading Ragnor Jonasson’s DARK ICELAND books, so I’m very late to the series, and I’m beginning at the end! Jonasson has been billed as writing ‘Nordic Noir of the highest order’ and ‘breathing new life in Nordic Noir’, so I was very excited to read WINTERKILL. It’s the sixth installment in the series, which began in SNOWBLIND and introduced the series protagonist Detective Ari Thor Arason. So our principle character has obviously a long history with fans of these books, and I looked forward to reading to see how this works as standalone for a new reader. What a credit to the skills of the writer, that its quality narrative relays enough information to settle the reader in and the new investigation runs beautifully alongside this.

WINTERKILL is a quality Nordic Noir (translated brilliantly by David Warriner) that reels you in from the opening emergency operator call to the duty Inspector on call: Ari Thor Arason. Siglufjordur is the setting, a land of day and night, where the sun barely sets in the summer. It’s so remote, it becomes almost uninhabitable. This remote Northern Icelandic village provide the frozen backdrop to the investigation of a teenage girl’s body found in a unusual setting.

Now, in term’s of character, obviously I’m missing the previous character developments, so have only a surface level of understanding of this journey through the series narrative. I was aware I missed out, but in all honesty, it didn’t impede my enjoyment of this book. There’s a great sense of humanity in Ari, and you can’t help but respect how he works and lives; he’s a character who’s dealing with several issues in his private life as well and these pop up throughout the central crime story.

The investigation is a delight for the reader to follow, pick up clues and surmise where the plot is heading. It’s really well crafted and the quality of the translation adds to the success of this. The pace is slow, but works. The readers glances in onto different characters as Arason investigates the complex nature of a seemingly tragic suicide.

I did find the contemplative nature of the story-telling the more dominant aspect of the book, perhaps as it’s the end of the series, and therefore the crime is in a more secondary position. From the more reflective, personal thoughts of our protagonist the reader gets a sense of humanity, desires, needs, love and reflection – all working well to add depth. For many, this is the final book in a loved series, for me, it’s the start of a new adventure – to find out how we arrive at this point, and I look forward to beginning my journey.

An accomplished character driven crime novel, set in a unique world of snow and light, where the darkness in humanity is uncovered by a driven, complex and engaging protagonist.

The Author

Icelandic crime writer Ragnar Jónasson was born in Reykjavík, and currently works as a lawyer, while teacher copyright law at the Reykjavík University Law School. In the past, he’s worked in TV and radio, including as a news reporter for the Icelandic National Broadcasting Service. Before embarking on a writing career, Ragnar translated fourteen Agatha Christie novels into Icelandic, and has had several short stories published in German, English and Icelandic literary magazines. Ragnar set up the first overseas chapter of the CWA (Crime Writers’ Association) in Reykjavík, and is co-founder of the International crime-writing festival Iceland Noir.

Ragnar’s debut thriller, Snowblind became an almost instant bestseller when it was published in June 2015 with Nightblind (winner of the Dead Good Reads Most Captivating Crime in Translation Award) and then Blackout, Rupture and Whiteout following soon after. To date, Ragnar Jónasson has written five novels in the Dark Iceland series, which has been optioned for TV by On the Corner. He lives in Reykjavík with his wife and two daughters.

WINTERKILL publishes 21 January 2021

http://orendabooks.co.uk/