Random Things Tours: Pursued by Death by Gunnar Staalesen translated by Don Bartlett

There is no perfect summer without Orenda Books (there are some summer sales waiting for you, by the way). I missed a lot their good mixture of mystery, thriller and adventure, particularly those belonging to the ´Nordic Noir´ category.

This time, I am back to a Norwegian author that I had the chance to translate several time, an iconic figure in the Nordic and Norwegian literature, Gunnar Staalesen. He is considered one of the founders of the genre and his Varg Veum series continue since 1977! I was not even born then...

Pursued by Death, translated into English by Don Bartlett continues the series, with an installment where socio-political disputes do meet deep psychological observations. And, as usual, Veum is the right man at the right place to process all the information and get involved in solving complicated socio-political riddles.

Purely by accident, it happened to meet a youngster before he was about to attend a protest against a fish-farming facility. Soon, he will read about his disappearance, in newspaper articles trying to find his whereabaouts. Curious by nature, he will pay a visit to Solvik, the village where he was last seen, And also by accident, he may discover a corpse, maybe the body of a journalist who was too invested into researching, surprise, the same fish-farming topic?

With intelligence and dedication, and some smart inferences that may lead to solving two cases at once, Veum is able to dismantle a web of lies and deceit, figuring out details of intricated local politics and terrifying ways of action. Dark local politics and their perpetrators, a reversed image of the postcard ready images of the area around Bergen. 

I particularly got interested in the ways in which Staalesen reveals the micro-society, the human and social network of interests and ambitions, the greed and violence hidden under the appearance of peaceful landmarks.

Pursued by Death is a novel that you cannot put down, and you cannot stop thinking about it when it´s over. 

Rating: 4.5 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered as part of the book tour but the opinions are, as usual, my own