The Human Part by Kari Hotakainen

The Human Part is an abstract and quite one-sided view of modern Helsinki (and Finland), but as long as you remember this fact, Hotakainen's quirky novel is a joy to read.

The format of the novel is refreshingly different. The story starts with the narrative of the subject of the book, Salme Sinikka Malmikunnas, a a retired haberdashery shop owner. Salme meets an author with writer's block, and for a vast sum of money, agrees to sell her life story to him. (I wonder if authors are wealthier in Finland?) But soon they disagree on the truthfulness of the end product. Salme does not like 'made-up books', but the author cannot help himself, and turns Salme's colourful life into fiction.

Or does he?

A major tragedy 'a certain very sad thing' looms large over the telling of Salme's story. But because Salme is adamant it's not going to be included in her life story, we are left guessing what has happened. All we know is that Salme's husband, Paavo 'is temporarily mute' because of it. But there are further sad things in Salme's life which she herself seems oblivious to. Her three children who all live in and around Helsinki, are not how they appear either. Or has the author invented their other lives, the problems their mother doesn't know about?

As you can see this book is a complicated read, one which I would have enjoyed so much more, had the writer not constantly force-fed a his ideology (capitalism is bad) down my throat. Political theory is much more complicated than that, as is real life.

The Human Part is a good read, and it is especially interesting to fellow author. How would we like it, if while writing our novels, we came face to face with our main character, insisting we are doing a bad job of it? Scary thought...

In the Darkness by Karin Fossum

In the Darkness is one of 10 books this prolific Norwegian queen of crime, Karin Fossum, has written featuring the reticent Inspector Seijer. This first book in the series, which came out in Norway in 1995, has only now been translated into English, even though the other nine titles have already been published here.

I am a great fan of Fossum. Her plots keep you in as much suspense as, say Jo Nesbo, but she sheds much less blood on the pages. With a lesser body count, the writing has to perform better, and this is indeed where Karin Fossum excels. Her characters, often ordinary people faced with and doing extraordinary things, are well drawn. Fossum relies heavily on physiology rather than caricatures and manages to get away from the traditional plot of a head scratching policeman, who of his own back goes in search of a killer, only to find another victim, and so it goes on, until the said ridiculously (stupidly) brave detective finds himself face to face with the killer, and wins the day.

In this first book in the Seijer series, the complicated central character is Eva, an ambitious artist and single mother to Emma, an overweight six-year-old. Struggling with money, Eva meets an old friend who offers her a way out of poverty. But as you may have guessed, there is no such thing as easy money.

The novel is set in a small industrial Norwegian town, which is 'only beautiful after dark', with a fast running river being its only redeeming feature. Both the river and the mountains framing the town feature heavily in the plot. The feel of the book is contemporary, but the lack of mobile phones, or GPS technology, makes the plot seem a little unconvincing. This was most marked in the beginning of the book where, when she finds a body floating in the river, Eva makes a call to the police from a public phone booth. Had I known the book was in fact written in the early 1990's, I would have probably enjoyed it more. Instead I kept thinking, why is communicating so difficult for these people?

But on the whole I definitely enjoyed In the Darkness. It has a good, fast plot, with an excellent twist in the end, which I sort of guessed, but had forgotten about while I worried for the heroine. Plus all the people in the novel were very convincing. Nobody is wholly bad, or wholly good.

The beauty of having enjoyed this book is that there are nine more to read straight away. Hurrah!

In The Darkness by Karin Fossum is published by Harvill Secker

Unwanted by Kristina Ohlsson

This crime story, set in modern Stockholm, is Ohlsson's debut novel. It has a gruesome subject matter of disappearing children, a current favourite topic amongst Scandinavian crime writers, it seems. (See Boy in a Suitcase by Leene Kaarbol and Agnette Friis, for example.)

'Unwanted', however, is a very engaging story and not as harrowing as the subject matter would suggest.

The narrative opens with the point of view of a man who obviously has some serious mental problems. In the dead of night he's lying awake next to a woman who he has previously abused. Again, it seems a current trend in crime fiction to reveal the madman at the centre of the story (Jo Nesbo does this too).

Usually when a crime novel begins with a prologue in the head of the perpetrator, my heart sinks a little, but Ohlsson weaves the many points of view nicely into the story. Even though the reader knows 'who dunnit', this fact doesn't make you want to read to the end as fast as possible in order to find out why and how.

The narrative moves to a train journey during which a child goes missing. At first the estranged father of the little girl is suspected until she is found dead, dumped naked outside a hospital.

The main protagonists, trying to solve the crime in the book, are three very different policemen: a respected older police inspector Alex Recht, a younger policeman with marital problems, Peder Rydh, and a woman, Frederika Bergman, who has just entered the police force. She is a 'civilian', and an academic. It's clear from the beginning that Frederika doesn't fit into the cosy mutually respecting and lighthearted club the two men in the team have set up. Both Alex and Peder are constantly suspicious of Frederika's rather stiff official manner, or her different ideas on how to move the investigation forward.

But when another child is abducted, Fredrika's methodological approach to investigating a crime is shown to be more successful than the old-fashioned, instinct-driven way Alex and Peder are used to working.

This internal conflict between the three policemen is like a breath of fresh air in the story of murder and mayhem; it makes the narrative much more interesting when the characters are multifaceted.

There are also a few red herrings littered along the plot lines, something which again makes the reader want to carry on reading. And the ending is satisfyingly drawn-out while not being stupidly so.

If you're into your Scandi crime and are looking for a new talented writer in the genre, you could do much worse than read Christina Ohlsson.

Unwanted
by Christina Ohlsson
Translated by Sarah Death
Published by Simon & Schuster
Paperback £12.99 /Kindle £6.99

Bad Intentions by Karin Fossum

As you might have noticed from this blog, I do really enjoy a good Scandinavian crime novel. I treat them as leisure reading, as opposed to books I have to read for work or reviews. That being said, most books give me real pleasure to read, but you know how sometimes you just want a really good, easy, rollocking crime novel to get your mind into different gear.

But when I began reading Karin Fossum's latest offering, I realised this was a crime writer who didn't adhere to the usual rules. She's been quoted saying that she likes to write about the death not the killing, and this is certainly true in Bad Intentions. Her main - recurring - character Inspector Seijer (this is the seventh in the series) is a mere spectator in the plot, and only appears a third way through the narrative.

Her main point of view is one of the three young men who at the start of the novel are spending a night in a log cabin by Dead Water. One of the boys is drowned in the aptly named lake. A few days later another young man's body is found in another lake and so the plot thickens.

Bad Intentions has been described a 'whydunnit' rather than 'whodunnit'. I think this is an excellent description of this intense semi-phsylogical thriller. The pace and intensity increases towards the end to such a fever point that I had to finish reading the novel in the middle of night, in tune with the Englishman's gentle snoring.

Although there is no direct mention of the far right in the book, and racism is only hinted at - or rather being taken for granted, if you like - I couldn't help but think back to the awful recent events on the island of Utoe in Norway, where the books are set (country not island). The society Fossum describes in her books is chillingly Nordic in flavour. You can almost taste the dissatisfaction and disassociation from society of these young men. For me, the plot of Bad Intentions was almost too true to life.

Bad Intentions by Karin Fossum
Vintage Books, £7.99

My Soul to Take by Yrsa Sigurdardottir

Yrsa Sigurdardottir

It's refreshing to read a Scandinavian crime thriller that hasn't got a middle-aged, morose male as the heroic detective. I do love Wallander and his Scandinavian angst, as well as the dark political intrigue of Stieg Larsson's Millennium series, but sometimes it's lovely to have a heroine who is intelligent, funny and has no piercings.

Although the life of Yrsa Sigurdardottir's female lead, Thora Gudmundsdottir, is all but perfect: as a divorced attorney, she's a single mother. She has an ongoing argument with her ex; her secretary is ignorant and lazy and her finances are in disarray. Yet, Thora also possesses the crucial characteristics needed for a crime novel heroine: curiosity and single-mindnedness.

In My Soul to Take, Thora is thrown into the middle of a murder investigation in a new-age hotel in a remote part of Iceland. The owner, Jonas, believes the place to be haunted and wants compensation from the local family who sold him the old farm buildings. When a woman is found dead in the grounds, Thora cannot but get involved. Stubbornly she brushes away the rumours of ghostly goings-on. She investigates the past but finds almost everyone is reluctant to give her information. Is that because in the cellar amongst the old boxes she finds an old Nazi flag and leaflets?

The plot of the novel is cleverly crafted around a time-honoured device - that of an isolated location. Nothing could be more sinister than a remote, haunted hotel, half-empty of guests, and full of idle staff such as sex therapists and tarot card readers.

Everyone around Thora seems to be convinced that something supernatural is present at the site. Even her German lover, who turns up at the hotel unannounced, hears the cries of a small child in the dead of night.

There's also great humour in the book; Thora's teenage son, who's girlfriend is heavily pregnant, decides to leave the care of his father because of the father's annoying habit of constantly playing SingStar on the children's Play Station.

The novel is full of twists and turns - the tension holds to the last moment. The end and the culprit were a complete surprise to me - and that is rare thing indeed.

Three of Yrsa Sigurdardottir's thrillers have been translated into English and a fourth one, Blessed Are the Children is due to be published in the UK by Hodder next year.

Yrsa Sigurdardottir will be talking about her writing and signing copies of her books at England's Lane Books on 18th March at 7 pm. Entry is free, so if you are able, come along and listen to this fascinating new Scandinavian crime writer.

My Soul to Take by Yrsa Sigurdardottir. Published by Hodder at £7.99.

The Year of the Hare by Arto Paasilinna

The Year of the Hare became a classic in Finland as soon as it was published 1975. Only two years later it was made into a film. It has since been translated into 25 languages and has also been selected as one of the representative masterpieces of literature by UNESCO.

It's midsummer and Vatanen, a newspaper journalist, together with a photographer from Helsinki; 'two dissatisfied, cynical men, getting on for middle age,' are on an assignment in Heinola, central Finland. 'The beauty of the Finnish summer evening is lost on them both' and they run over a hare. Vatanen jumps out of the car in search of the injured animal and instead of re-joining his colleague, spends the night in 'a sweet-smelling hayloft' with 'the hare lying in his armpit'.

So begins an adventure involving a man and a hare which includes a separation from his 'not very nice' wife, an arrest and friendship with a District Superintendent, a forest fire, a milk maid, a bear hunt, a Soviet border crossing, a drunken binge or two (this is a Finnish book about a Finnish man after all) and a love affair.

As you read this book you begin to realise none of these things could really happen to just one man. What Arto Paasilinna's sparse prose describes instead is the common dream of all city dwellers - to up sticks and leave for the wilderness. He expresses the basic human need to be one with nature. It's admirable how Herbet Lomas has managed to convey the simple tone of the book in his excellent English translation (first published in the UK in 1995).

Arto Paasilinna's The Year of the Hare was published the same year as the Good Life was first screened on British TV; it was a time right after The Oil Crisis when people started to realise that the earth's resources were limited; when moving back to the country and appreciating old rural way of life became fashionable. But in the past thirty years this book has not lost any of its significance or topicality. The Soviet Union may have disintegrated, the Berlin Wall fallen, but we are still burning oil at a rate of knots and bears are still roaming free around the Eastern borders of Finland.

The Year of the Hare is also a wonderful insight into the Finnish psyche, particularly the mind of a Finnish man. I do not wish to comment on the lack of positive female role models in the book - unless a simple, undemanding milkmaid could be seen as one. The book was after all written about the time when my mother would have burned her bra - and as all Finnish women know, the Finn was one of the last to evolve into something even closely resembling a modern man. (You guessed it - that is a completely different conversation and one I should be conducting elsewhere - perhaps here?) Suffice to say that if you overlook a few issues of sexism and animal rights, this book is a delight to read - whether you are Finnish or not.

The Year of the Hare was the first Finnish book I bought The Englishman all those years ago. He liked it so much he recently reread it and again laughed out loud at the adventures of Vatanen and his hare.

For me, that's enough of a recommendation.

Purge by Sofi Oksanen

It took me a long time to get around reading this book. From the very start when I saw it in Finland and then heard about its brilliance from my friends, I knew the subject matter would be very difficult for me to read about. Especially if the book was well written.

I knew the purge in the book referred to the mass deportation of Estonian 'dissidents' by Stalin to Siberian gulags. I also knew it centred around three generations of Estonian women.

The original Finnish version of Purge, Puhdistus, by the Finnish-Estonian writer, Sofi Oksanen, started life as a play. As a novel, published in 2008, it has won the most prestigious of literary prizes, The Finlandia Award, The Nordic Council Literary Prize and The FNCA Prize in France, but to name a few. The book has been translated to some 40 languages and is to be turned into a film in Finland, to premier in 2012.

The story of Purge slowly unravels the horrors that three generations of Estonian women experienced, from the German occupation during the 2nd World War, to the oppression of the Soviet era and to present day sex trafficking.  In its centre the novel has a tragic love story, reflected against the backdrop of the powerful, changing occupations of a land and its people. The writer herself has said that she wanted to use the female body as a metaphor for an occupied country.

Ageing Aliide Truu lives alone in her family's old farmhouse - a privilege which we learn she's had to pay dearly for - when a young twenty-something girl, Zoe appears on her doorstep. Bruised and scantily clothed, Zoe claims to be escaping a violent husband, but the experienced older woman suspects all is not as the girl explains. What's more she sounds like a Russian with an odd accent, 'But this girl's Estonian had a different flavour, something older, yellow and moth-eaten. There was a strange taste of death in it.'  Zoe's sudden appearance makes Aliide recall old, deeply buried memories, and Aliide cannot wait to get rid of the intruder.

The story weaves between Estonia of the 1990's, recounting Zoe's horrific fate, with that of Aliide's tragic personal history. The reader's attention is held with a plot twist in each chapter, with a small piece of information about the two women's past revealing more and more horrific details. In spite of the horror and the suffering described, the reader cannot but be spellbound by the writing: why is Aliide so bitter and so afraid of her neighbours when the Soviet occupiers have long since gone? Why does she still wear two pairs of underpants? How did Zoe end up the way she has, and why and how did she come to this house in rural Estonia of all places?

This book is not a cheerful read. It's also not a Nordic crime thriller. It is, however, an intelligent page turner about a piece of history which is not often written about. There's a raw honesty in the novel about human behaviour in the face of cruel injustice which is unusual. Just as I knew I would, I found it a difficult read, but having finished it I now want to go over it again a little more carefully, rather than with my heart pounding at the turn of each page. I suggest you do just that the first time around, if you can.

Yesterday I recommended this book on a radio interview with BBC World Service, and I know I won't be the last book seller who'll have this book on their shelves as a 'must read'.