Crime thriller set in NORTH NORWAY

19th February 2025

Into Thin Air by Orjan Karlsson, crime thriller set in North Norway, between Bødo and Røst

Translated by Ian Giles

The Arctic Mysteries Book 1

Into Thin Air by Orjan Karlsson is the first in an exciting new crime series set between Bodø in north Norway, and the isolated little island of Røst 100km offshore from there. Bodø is on a peninsula at the end of the Saltfjorden, a lush and mountainous area amongst all the bewildering number of islets and skerries that make up this oh-so-fractured area of Norway. And oh-so-fractured in more ways than one, as the characters populating this story have almost as much to hide as they do places to hide it!

We are introduced to our key characters at the outset: our anonymous, camper driving perpetrator, further south on the mainland, with a victim already in the van. Jakob Weber in Bodø, a recently widowed, dog owning detective, mulling over a long-cold case with his retired partner, of a body with no name, when an apparent suicide is found in a local bunker – in this case, a name for the body, but no reason for the suicide, and suspicion is aroused. And finally, Noora Yun Sande, a young Norwegian officer of Asian descent who comes from a prestigious post in Oslo. Bodø isn’t the most obvious choice for career progression, being more akin to going from the big city to the boondocks, but there’s a reason behind her transfer, and this is revealed to be a sexual harassment case which, although she was clearly wronged, she knew would come out the worse for her in a “he said she said’ situation, resulting in her becoming an awkward pariah in her team, so the best or easiest option was to escape his clutches and start again elsewhere. She still retained an old candy bar mobile on which he could contact her, although to her credit she had at least stopped responding.

Then young runner Iselin, who has just, to her delight, discovered she’s been accepted for police fitness trials, goes out for a run on a difficult route among the local heights and is considering the form her new life might take if she’s accepted and moves away. Perhaps it’s time to ditch her boyfriend, son of a very influential local character, rather than have him come to Oslo with her?

But Iselin never returns from her run, and the investigation, bringing in the two other detectives on the team, Armann and Fine, and their surly boss ‘the Crow’, sees them struggling to piece together any leads or links between cases in this lovely chunky book, especially when another girl goes missing, and the team are really feeling the pressure of time ticking on to hopefully find the girls alive.

A supporting cast of suitably suspicious characters come onto the radar and unexpected visitors for both Jakob and Noora – one more welcome than the other! I confess there was one point of the denouement that I had suspicions about quite early on, but at the time when my ‘spidey-sense’ tingled I went back to check something, and that then denied it as a possibility so I dismissed it, so I was a bit surprised when it turned out to be so, but I guess that’s an element of deliberate misdirection to knock me off the scent!

It has a somewhat messy and inconvenient ending, which is not to say badly written at all, I only mean that it wasn’t all tied up neatly with a bow, which is actually refreshingly like life, and leaves certain areas open for a follow up. I am glad to hear that there will be a sequel, because the dynamic between Jakob, Noora and the team was enjoyable, and I shall look forward to more of their exploits. It was also nice to have the setting in a more unfamiliar, secluded and isolated place, rather than in a well known big city, as this presents a different range of issues when people are in a smaller community and everyone knows everyone else. The sense of place started out strongly but towards the end was a little more eclipsed by the characters and action, but I think that’s only to be expected. The author had in mind his upbringing in Bodø and a visit to Røst that inspired him and he wanted to bring the uniqueness of these areas into play as almost characters themselves in the novel, and I think in this he made a good choice and executed it well. All in all this was a very enjoyable and gripping read, an excellent debut into English for this exciting new talent added to the Orenda stable, smoothly translated by Ian Giles, who I hope is cracking on with the next one so we can all get back to Bodø soon!

Lee-Anne for the TripFiction Team

Catch reviewer Lee-Anne on Bluesky @onefootiniceland.bsky.social

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