14 Norway – The cold song – Linn Ullmann - August 2014 (Score 6.5)

Jenny   Brodal is a reformed alcoholic. She is on the point of backsliding when the book opens, and does so within minutes. She is 75. Jenny is Siri’s mother and Jon Dreyer’s mother-in-law. Jenny had a son, younger than Siri, who drowned at an early age.

Milla, a girl who has been missing for two years, is found buried. The finders are Simen, Gunnar Mandl and Christian, who were trying to find a “Treasure Trove” which they had buried in the woods some time before.

Siri and Jon’s children are Alma and Liv. Milla was employed for the summer to look after Liv, and to keep an eye on Alma who is older. They are on holiday. Things aren’t going well between Siri and Jon. He is an author with writer’s block at the start of the third volume of a trilogy, the first two volumes of which were highly successful. He has almost exhausted his rather large advance on the third book, and has written nothing after more than two years.

Siri is a restaurant owner, overworked and stressed. We feel that she may even have mental health problems.

We seem to be getting introduced to suspects for the presumed murder of Milla. Judging by the way Siri and Jon are thinking and behaving, both of them are possibilities. The boys who found her body were suspects. We know very quickly, however, that a boy known as KB has been charged with the murder. This is not, therefore, a murder mystery.

It is, rather, the well-written and compelling story of a family in trouble, who were on holiday when a girl disappeared, and again when her body was found.

We go back and find out how Milla came into the story, and more about the family. We learn that Simen is the son of the nearest neighbours when Siri and Jon go to their holiday home. We discover that Jon is having an affair with Karoline, a married woman who holidays with her husband near Jon and Siri.

The writing is very poetic, particularly when describing the various aspects of nature which impinge on the story.

Suddenly, in the middle of the description of Jenny’s birthday party, we are right there with Milla being raped by KB. Crucially, at this juncture, there is no mention of her being killed. Are we being led toward the murder having been committed by someone else? The author shows us an incident which may make Simen a prime suspect. Milla rescues him and takes him home to his parents when she finds him crying on his crashed bike, and suffering grit burns. He seems to develop a crush on her.

On page 158 there is a literary cross reference to a great work of early twentieth century fiction. Can you find it?

On page 173 we reprise the rape scene, but this time we get more information. Young Alma seems to be feeling guilty about Milla’s death. Something happened when her Grandmother Jenny took her on a mad drunken drive through the woods on her, Jenny’s, birthday, and it has affected her behaviour seriously. I will give you no more information on that one since it may spoil the story for you if I do.

To me the real mystery is whether the police have arrested the right person, and I think there are clues to suggest that they may not have. For example, from page 318, what is the purpose of the accidental meeting between Jon and one of the young boys who found Milla’s body? This could be to point to the boy being involved - “I knew we were cycling in the wrong place” and “Irma wasn’t a very nice person … she glowed in the dark”.

I score the book at 8.0.