Midnight Sun

Starred review from December 21, 2015
Jon, the narrator of this excellent standalone from Edgar-finalist Nesbø, is a “fixer,” or hit man, akin to the hero of 2015’s Blood on Snow. Jon, who has done jobs for an Oslo crime boss known as the Fisherman, has fled the city for Kåsund, a tiny village in the far north populated by Sami (Lapps) and dominated by a very strict religious ethos. Taking refuge in a church, he tells the townspeople he meets that his name is Ulf. A stranger in a strange land, Ulf slowly reveals what led him to leave Oslo: a failed hit and a theft that has Johnny Moe, the Fisherman’s henchman, after him. Ulf is a bad boy with a heart of gold; he got into trouble because he was trying to help someone close to him. His self-mocking deprecations are endearing: “Not that I’m an irresponsible or careless person; I’ve just got really bad judgment.” Immaculately plotted and perfectly paced, the book is also darkly funny and deadly serious. Scandinavian gloom notwithstanding, it has a neatly satisfying and surprisingly moving ending. Agent: Niclas Salomonsson, Salomonsson Agency (Sweden).

April 25, 2016
This short Norwegian thriller focuses on an antihero (in this case a sympathetic one) involved with a brutal Oslo crime lord known as the Fisherman. The story unfolds from the perspective of Jon, who uses his reputation as a killer to gain a high-paying job as assassin for the Fisherman in order to pay for medication for his leukemia-stricken daughter. When Jon is morally unable to fulfill an assigned contract, he’s forced to flee the Fisherman’s wrath—and Oslo—for a map speck above the Arctic Circle populated by a strict religious sect. There he begins a new life, making friends and enemies, and falling in love with a young widow, while never forgetting that, eventually, he’ll have to deal with the Fisherman. Singer-songwriter Gordon, cofounder of the alt rock band Sonic Youth, reads for the audio edition of this male-narrated novel. Gordon’s voice, though smoky and properly dramatic when necessary, is clearly feminine. While this may serve the author’s prose well enough in general, the gender contrast has a tendency to undermine some of the novel’s more violent and more intimate passages. A Knopf hardcover.