English Translations of Scandinavian/Nordic Mysteries & Thrillers discussion

For the month of June 2022 we have five books to choose from so far. We will add books as they become known to us. Good reading.

1) Terminal Force by Trevor Scott to be published on the 2nd of June 2022. Greenland.

Jake Adams gets a heads up from an old colleague that the Chinese Communist Party has put out a hit on him. This isn’t a new concept for Jake to comprehend. Many have come for him in the past, killing those closest to him. But now Jake has too much to lose. He must retreat and regroup before going on the offense. With Sirena’s help, along with a cast of characters from his past, Jake takes it to his enemies in the most brutal counter-offensive he has ever launched. From the unforgiving frigid darkness of Greenland, to the snowy Alps where the elite of the world meet, Jake must overcome remarkable odds to survive this final showdown between the forces of good over the evil of the Chinese Ministry of State Security. Will Jake finally find peace, or will this be his terminal mission?

2) Cold Fear by Brandon Webb tobe published on the 7th of June 2022. Iceland.

Finn's search for his memory of one fateful night leads him to Iceland--only to be followed by an unhinged assassin intent on stopping him--in the riveting follow-up to Steel Fear, from the New York Times bestselling writing team Webb & Mann, combat-decorated Navy SEAL Brandon Webb and award-winning author John David Mann.

Disgraced Navy SEAL Finn is on the run. A wanted man since he jumped ship from the USS Abraham Lincoln, he's sought for questioning in connection to war crimes committed in Yemen by a rogue element in his SEAL team. But his memory of that night--as well as the true fate of his mentor and only friend, Lieutenant Kennedy--is a gaping hole.

Finn learns that three members of his team have been quietly redeployed to Iceland, which is a puzzle in itself; the tiny island nation is famous for being one of the most peaceful, crime-free places on the planet.

His mission is simple: track down the three corrupt SEALs and find out what really happened that night in Yemen. But two problems stand in his way. On his first night in town a young woman mysteriously drowns--and a local detective suspects Finn's involvement. What's worse, a SEAL-turned-contract-killer with skills equal to Finn's own has been hired to make sure he never gets the answers he's looking for. And he's followed Finn all the way to the icy north.

3) The Lover by Helene Flood to be published on the 23rd of June 2022. Norway.

Is it worse to lie to your husband or the police?

Rikke is deceiving them both. When their upstairs neighbour Jørgen is found dead, she's questioned alongside her husband Åsmund.

How can Rikke admit in front of Åsmund that Jørgen and her were having an affair? Or explain to the police the complexity of her feelings for Jørgen? The hint of relief that he's dead. And, as the investigation closes in on the neighbourhood, how long can she conceal the affair from her neighbours, her husband and her teenage daughter?

Rikke knows she can't hide the phone calls, emails and messages from the police. So she cuts herself a deal. In return for a few days' grace to tell Åsmund before anyone else does, she'll share everything about the affair.

But before she can summon the courage to confess, Rikke is struck by a chilling revelation. Jørgen can only have been killed by someone living in their small apartment building.

4) W. by Steve Sem-Sandberg to be published on the 28th of June 2022. Sweden.

In this internationally acclaimed novel, Steve Sem-Sandberg brilliantly refracts the story of Büchner's groundbreaking play Woyzeck through a new lens

W., the astonishing new novel by August Prize– winning author Steve Sem-Sandberg, is a literary reimagining of one of modern literature’s touchstone texts, the play Woyzeck. Considered the first modern drama, Woyzeck tells the story of a loyal soldier and survivor of the Napoleonic Wars who, in a fit of jealous rage, kills the woman he loves. In 1836 this true story inspired Georg Büchner to write the play, unfinished at his death at just twenty-three years old.

W. grippingly recounts the lovers’ relationship, the murder case, and the soldier’s execution. The story unfolds as the soldier W. struggles to recount the events of his life. He grasps at understanding and experiences feelings of time and timelessness. He finds patterns and repetitions, but these are of no interest to those determining his fate.

Sem-Sandberg searched court archives to bring new light to this story, and he masterfully sustains a rich period atmosphere through poetic and controlled prose, down to the choice of pronouns as the soldier is held at a cold distance in court proceedings when addressed with the formal, capitalized “You.”

Against a landscape devastated by inhumanity and greed that, yet, manages to sustain hope, Steve Sem-Sandberg’s W. tells a ruthless, moving, and utterly relevant story as the soldier W. desperately and humanly fights to make something of the life given to him.

5) Crocodile Beat: A Greenland Missing Persons Stand-Alone Novel by Christoffer Petersen to be published on the 30th of June 2022. Australia.

In Australia's vast and desolate Northern Territory, Constable Petra 'Piitalaat' Jensen's most southerly missing persons case might just be her last.

Forced to take some well-earned leave, Petra looks for solace in the Australian Outback, only to find herself caught up in a search for a missing police sergeant.

Crocodile Beat is a stand-alone novel from the Greenland Missing Persons series of novellas and novels normally set in the harsh, unpredictable Arctic, rich in tradition, myth and culture.

Crocodile Beat continues the adventures of Constable Petra 'Piitalaat' Jensen, ably assisted by interesting characters, together with a few familiar faces making cameo appearances in the series.

All the Greenland Missing Persons stories are set prior to The Ice Star and Seven Graves, One Winter.

6) Song of the Shieldmaiden by Ashley Hagood to be published on the 10th of June 2022. Viking.

A Viking shieldmaiden must decide which is the more dangerous weapon: the sword or the heart?

Svanhild, the eldest daughter of a Viking jarl, dreams of being a shieldmaiden.
When a cruel usurper steals her family’s throne, she must act quickly to spare her family from the enemy’s axe. Guided by the gods, she agrees to a betrothal with the enemy’s son – one she will never go through with.
What her heart truly desires is revenge.
But the Norse gods have woven a dangerous fate for Svanhild and her two younger sisters… and the trickster god Loki plays his games. As the new jarl unleashes fresh cruelties on her family, Svanhild is torn between love and revenge.
Does she have what it takes to fight for her family and fulfill her destiny, even if it breaks her heart?

Sweet Revenge by Camilla Läckberg to be published on the 23 of June 2022. Sweden.

Two gripping novellas from the No.1 international bestselling author

Women Without Mercy
Ingrid gave up her career to support her husband. Now he's having an affair.
Birgitta is avoiding the doctor. No one can see the bruises her husband leaves.
Victoria left Russia to marry a man she met online. But he is nothing like she imagined. Maybe the only way out is to commit three perfect murders...

Truth or Dare
Best friends Liv, Martina, Max and Anton are spending New Year's Eve together.
But each of them is keeping a terrible secret. When a game of truth or dare takes a dark turn, the shocking truth emerges. Not everyone will live to see the chime of midnight...

To avoid disappointment, please note that these two novellas have been previously published separately

We Have Christoffer Petersen with a new book called "Constable Peter Jensen #4: Omnibus Edition (book 10-12) to be published on the 8th of June 2022. Greenland.

Travel to Greenland with Constable Petra ‘Piitalaat’ Jensen in this omnibus edition of the next three books in the popular Greenland Missing Persons series.

These three previously published mystery novellas feature newly graduated police constable Petra Jensen at the very start of her career, ably assisted by a cast of familiar characters.

This omnibus edition includes:

The Rock Thief
When the daughter of a Russian diplomat goes missing in the Greenland desert, Constable Petra Jensen is assigned to the case to avoid a diplomatic incident.

The Glacier Wraith
Constable Petra ‘Piitalaat’ Jensen discovers a new side to her supervisor Sergeant Duneq when a team of celebrity ghost hunters arrives in Greenland demanding police protection.

The Blister at the End of the World
Greenland grabs the attention of the world when a famous British teenager goes missing during a school trip to the Arctic.

In this short novel, Constable Petra Jensen struggles to cope with the notorious British tabloid press, and when the girl disappears, Petra becomes the face of the search for the missing teenager.

Devils and Details a Short Story from Guerrilla Greenland Book 3 by Christoffer Petersen to be published on the 27th of June 2022, Greenland.

When the IGA extends the offer of talks on neutral ground to the Greenland guerrillas, Kamiila Sorsuttartoq takes drastic steps to discover the Americans’ true intentions.

Devils and Details is a short twenty-minute read plucked from Christoffer Petersen’s Guerrilla Greenland series of speculative novellas.

The Body by the Shore by Tabish Khair to be published on the 7th of June 2022. Denmark. Was to be published on the 22nd of April 2022, but the date of publication wasn't until the 7th of June 2022.

A novel of suspense and intrigue set in the post-pandemic world

Harris Maloub, a killer with an erased official past, now in his fifties, is visited by someone who could not be alive and given an assignment. In Aarhus, Denmark, Jens Erik, police officer on pre-retirement leave, somehow cannot forget the body of a Black man recovered from the sea some years ago. On an abandoned oil rig in the North Sea, turned into a resort for the very rich, Michelle, a young Caribbean woman, realizes that the man she has followed to this job is not what he claims to be. And neither is the rig, where a secret laboratory bares to her a face that is neither human nor animal. Behind all this, there lurks the ghost of a seminar in 2007: most of the participants of that seminar are dead or untraceable. Why was their obscure research on plants and fungi and microbes so important? What is the secret that killed them? What is the weapon that powerful syndicates are trying to obtain – or develop?

Narrated from the perspective of the post-pandemic world around 2030, but moving back in time to cover all of the 21st century, and even bits and pieces from the 20th and the 19th, The Body by the Shore is a novel of suspense and speculation about the complexity of life and intricacy of the earth. It is also a novel about reason and emotion, love and despair, greed and hope, human beings and microbes. When the narrative strands come together, a world of great terror and beauty is revealed to the reader.

Please do remember to export out all your user data before the changeover to prevent content loss. Anyone know how???

Behind the Scenes by Christoffer Petersen to be published on the 10th of June 2022. Greenland.

Running a revolution is hard work. When supplies run low for the guerrillas in Greenland, Kamiila Sorsuttartoq leads a daring raid on an American supply vessel, unaware it is an IGA trap designed to lure Constable David Maratse out of hiding.

Behind the Scenes is a short twenty-minute read plucked from Christoffer Petersen’s Guerrilla Greenland series of speculative novellas.