The Press

Book of the week

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THE DARKNESS RAGNAR JONASSON MICHAEL JOSEPH (PENGUIN IMPRINT), $37

Reviewed by Ken Strongman

If you have ever doubted the appropriat­eness of the phrase “Nordic noir”, The Darkness will dispel any hesitation. Hulda Hermansdot­tir is a detective inspector in the Reykjavik police and is being forced into retirement a few months early in order to make way for a young ascendant star. Thus begins the depressing and aptly named book.

Hulda is essentiall­y alone, her daughter and husband having died some years previously. There are two glimmers of hope in her life. She is given a cold case on which to spend her nal two weeks, involving the death of a young Russian asylum seeker. It had been summarily cast out as a suicide. And Hulda is beginning to form a relationsh­ip with a retired, widowed doctor.

This is as good as it gets. The investigat­ion is beset by dif culty and vagueness, any clarity being short lived. Was human traf cking and prostituti­on involved or not? Were the police in the original investigat­ion culpable? And, above all, why is Hulda somewhat avoidant of commitment to the new relationsh­ip?

The lowering noir (Even Huldas’s dead daughter had been called Dimma, which translates as “darkness”) is set in the barren, near wasteland of Iceland outside the capital. The atmosphere, both physical and social, becomes increasing­ly menacing and one knows that things will end badly. In what way this happens (and how badly) is the strength of the book. There are ever-darker surprises, culminatin­g in a nish that leaves one with a highly disturbing image.

The Darkness is well spoken of by eminent crime writers such as Gregg Hurwitz and Simon Kernick. They were, I think, a little generous. The book is not in their league, but it does add well enough to Nordic noir

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