SERGEANT GUNNHILDUR - The discovery of a corpse washed up on a beach in an Icelandic backwater sparks a series of events that propels the village of Hvalvik's police sergeant into deep waters. While the majority of Nordic cops are rather dour, this provincial female cop is a breath of fresh air as she dives headlong into a corrupt and very male world with a sassy drive to succeed. Hopefully the first of many cases for her.
February 2011 Book of the Month.
The Lovereading view...
Murder, corruption and financial meltdown in Iceland from an author whose intimate knowledge of the recent upheavals there packs a real punch. Meticulously constructed its key protagonist female police sargeant Gunnhildur must leave a quiet safe backwater of her local community and into a hostile world where dealing, double dealing, shady deals and violence are the order of the day.
The discovery of a corpse washed up on a beach in an Icelandic backwater sparks a series of events that propels the village of Hvalvik's police sergeant Gunnhildur into deep waters. Although under pressure to deal with the matter quickly, she is suspicious that the man's death was no accident and once she has identified the body, sets about investigating his final hours. The case takes Gunnhildur away from her village and into a cosmopolitan world of shady deals, government corruption and violence. She finds herself alone and less than welcome in this hostile environment as she tries to find out who it was that made sure the young man drowned on a dark night one hundred kilometres from where he should have been - and why.
Brought up in the south of England, Quentin Bates took up the offer of a gap year working in Iceland in 1979, and found himself spending a gap decade there. During the 1980s he acquired a family, a new language and a new profession, before returning to the UK in 1990. Since then he has been, among other things, a full-time marine journalist.
Frozen Out is born of the author's intimate knowledge of Iceland and its people, along with a fascination with the recent upheaval in Iceland's turbulent society. Quentin and his wife regularly return to their friends, relatives and other home in the north of Iceland.
