Agency_Spring_2022_Fiction

Cappelen Damm Agency FICTION RIGHTS CATALOGUE

FICTION Cappelen Damm Agency 2022

Spring 2022 Here you will find some of Norway’s leading contemporary authors.

INGVILD HAUGLAND Rights Director ingvild.haugland@cappelendamm.no Phone +47 414 10 647

ANETTE SLETTBAKK GARPESTAD Rights Manager anette.garpestad@cappelendamm.no Phone +47 984 82 087

IDA AMALIE SVENSSON Contracts Manager/Rights Manager ida.svensson@cappelendamm.no Phone +47 977 50 106

Follow us on Facebook and our webpage www.cappelendammagency.no Do you want our newsletters? Send an email to Anette Garpestad.

CAPPELEN DAMM AGENCY Cappelen Damm is Norway's largest publishing house, publishing approximately 1000 titles a year within the genres of fiction, non-fiction, educational books and children's books.

Cappelen Damm is owned by Egmont.

Cappelen Damm Agency represents the rights of all of the authors in this catalogue. This includes titles from Flamme forlag, an imprint of Cappelen Damm AS. The Agency is responsible for all foreign book rights, as well as rights for TV, film, radio, anthologies, electronic media etc.

We are happy to answer any questions you may have regarding the authors and the sales of foreign rights.

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Kjersti Halvorsen

I’M THE ONE WHO CAN HELP YOU Psychologist Edvin works at the Kvervel Manor. He is engaged and soon to be a father for the first time. One day, he gets a new patient, André. Edvin knows him from his childhood but hesitates to tell his boss about their relationship. He is ashamed and unable to say more than ‘we went to school together’, which really doesn’t cover it. Edvin was bullied, and André was the bully. Now they have to deal with each other on a daily basis.

Why did André start taking drugs? Did Edvin have anything to do with what happened? Why was life so cruel to André but kind to Edvin? Or has life been kind to him?

Det er jeg som kan hjelpe deg 130 x 205 mm / 320 pages

Kjersti Halvorsen writes about complicated topics such as power, addiction, revenge and reconciliation in an entertaining way.

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE

Kjersti Halvorsen (b. 1993) grew up in Lier. She has attended author-studies at the college in Bø and studied psychology at the University of Oslo. She made her debut in 2019 with the novel Ida Takes Charge, a book that earned her a nomination to the Tarjei Vesaas debut prize.

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Kjersti Halvorsen

IDA TAKES CHARGE Ida's greatest fear is terror. This doesn't get any better when she meets Aksel at University; a lone wolf with dubious interest in weapons. Aksel has become an outsider, and Ida needs to take drastic measures: How can she prevent disaster, and save Axel. Perhaps equally important: How can she save herself?

Ida Takes Charge is a dark and funny debut novel about overcoming fear and finding your calling in life.

NOMINATED FOR THE TARJEI VESAAS' DEBUT PRIZE 2019

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE

Ida tar ansvar 130 x 205 mm / 224 pages

'Brilliant language … precise and observant. […] The novel explores, among other things, what can create a breeding ground for lonliness and xenopholia in young men, which allows them to end up as misogynists, despisers of society, or school shooters. It is well portayed, and you have to confront yourself while reading.'

DAG OG TID 'This book is a gem, in many ways a mystery novel.

Halvorsen writes with a razor sharp edge.'

DAGENS NÆRINGSLIV

TV-SERIES PREMIERE 2022!

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Peter Franziskus Strassegger

CASUALTY OF WAR One day, while tidying up, an author comes across a confession written by his grandfather. He isn’t unfamiliar with what he reads, but the new text brings new truths to light. Peter gains a deeper insight into his grandfather’s involvement in the war—at least as his grandfather chooses to remember it.

This confession forms the basis of an intricate and exciting story from the Second World War. The grandfather’s story is characterised by a desire for adventure and a need to grow as a person in his hometown of Bryne, in Germany and on the frontline in Russia.

But it also contains many unpleasant truths—particularly for Peter, who distances himself from his grandfather’s political position.

Om stein og jord 130 x 205 mm / 368 pages

With empathy, intelligence and a searching gaze, the author explores his grandfather’s story from the war. He travels to the same places, including Russia, and tries to understand what motivated his grandfather.

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE

Peter Franziskus Strassegger (b. 1984) was born in Austria but has lived in Norway since he was 12 years old. He was awarded the Tarjei Vesaas' debut award for his novel Stasia.

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Excerpt from Casualty of war On Christmas Eve my family visits the graves of our dead relatives. When we reach my grandfather’s grave, my mother reads his morning prayer. He wrote it late in life, and somehow it epitomizes his life in a way so very different to his confession. It’s a prayer filled with despair and loss, with grief and longing, but also hope. He would read it to himself every morning when he had sat down in his office and turned on his primitive PC, he who had become a factory owner, who would temper steel and buy lathes from Switzerland, every morning he would sit down in front of his PC and read this small prayer to God. Jesus, Light of the world. Have mercy on me. It was a cry for help, a painful admission that he harboured evil thoughts and ideas, that he had desired evil, but also that he prayed to Almighty God to guide him every day, to show him the good deeds which were waiting for him to do. Hearing my mother read this prayer has always made a profound impression on me, especially when I think of my grandfather’s fate, the SS soldier who was condemned and shunned. What dignity did he have left after the War? What did he pray for? And how did he want to face his death? What made the strongest impression on me was that he concluded by praying for his soul to be at peace at the end of his life.

Did he ask for too much?

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Hedda H. Robertsen

ROOM 66 The protagonist in Hedda Robertsen’s new novel, Room 66, is a young author living near Oslo’s oldest church. She devours books and films about nuns and monastic life. She dreams of renouncing desire, of purity, a strict and regimented life characterised by routine and dedication to a task, a calling.

But other forces also tug at her: she hungers for genuine connections with other people — with men. After several encounters with a nameless mechanic, she hires a car and heads south. Alone.

Her destination? A convent in France.

Rom 66 130 x 205 mm / 224 pages

We also meet Chris. Single mother by day, stripper by night. Chléo is a receptionist and works at a beach hotel in France. Iris is a nun, and every morning she puts on her black habit and goes to prayer with her head bowed.

Emma lives in London in a sexless relationship with architect James.

The five women find one another and share their stories of love, grief, loss and passion.

Hedda H. Robertsen (b. 1987) made her debut with the novel Shot to ribbons by Mads Mikkelsen in 2008.

She graduated from Warwick University in England and the University of Oslo. Room 66 is her fourth novel.

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Marianne Teie

RUNE’S WOMAN After two poetry collections, Marianne Teie debuts as a novelist with a harrowing, desperate and humorous novel about a young woman in a crisis. The nameless protagonist, “Rune’s woman”, travels to a cabin in the country to get away from Rune, but being alone triggers all her memories and longing. She’s not as alone as she’d like to be, either.

Rune’s Woman is a funny and dark novel about growing up, about the challenges of being a couple and about how difficult it is to find peace alone in a family cabin.

Dama til Rune 130 x 205mm / 224 pages

WISE NOVEL GIVES INSIGHT INTO EMOTIONAL WOUNDS '… a raw and beautiful (and clever) novel about deep wounds in the slipstream after mental illness.' 

Marianne Teie (b. 1978) resides in Oslo, where she also works as a teacher. Rune's Woman is her third publication.

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Kristian Klausen

THE SMALL MAN FROM ARGENTINA One of the worst war criminals in history arrives in the Norwegian town of Drammen in May 1960. He has escaped his pursuers to start a new life and is renting a flat in a building in Konnerudgata. He gets a job as a night watchman at a paper mill. He frequents a local café and learns Norwegian. He enters into a relationship with the novel’s other main character, Martha Dreyer, an author who lives two floors above him. Due to this relationship, his usual defence mechanisms start to fail. He starts to feel guilty. But even though he is troubled by his actions, he still struggles to acknowledge the scope of them.

Den lille mannen fra Argentina 130 x 205 mm / 176 pages

The historical figure is Adolf Eichmann, one of those chiefly responsible for organising the Holocaust.

THE EVIL IN OUR MIDST '… a stand-alone dashing and independent novel that will be a pleasure for any reader.'  STAVANGER AFTENBLAD '… Refreshing and original … Kristian Klausen writes well, and beautifully.'

VÅRT LAND

Kristian Klausen (b. 1971) has been a freelance writer and art instructor, and currently works as an environmental therapist with a psychiatric hospice.

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Kristian Klausen

ANNE F. Anne Frank died in Bergen-Belsen in spring 1945. Before that, she and her family, along with four other Jewish people, spent more than two years living in hiding on the upper floor of business premises in Amsterdam until they were discovered and deported.

Until the outbreak of war, Otto Frank runs a tobacco kiosk on Konnerudgata.

Later, again, it is Otto’s perspective we see. We meet him alone in Auschwitz and at Drammen railway station after the war, as the sole survivor. It is Otto who obtains the diaries that were left behind and starts to live through them.

A thought-provoking, gripping book from Kristian Klausen.

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE

Anne F. 130 x 205 mm / 144 pages

'… a successful novel about the Norwegian holocoust.'

MORGENBLADET '… both an interesting thought experiment and renewed litterature.'

DAG OG TID

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Synne Sun Løes

THE ANGRY PSYCHOLOGIST Idunn Jæger (49) is supposed to rescue other people. But one day, everything falls apart.

One Monday morning, psychologist Idunn Jæger finds a woman standing outside the District Psychiatric Centre (DPC) with a basketful of eggs. Before she has time to think it through, Idunn finds herself joining in as the woman hurls eggs at her workplace. A lot of eggs. It’s marvellous to see them smashing against the glass door.

Sinnapsykologen 130 x 205 mm / 416 pages

Idunn is 49 years old and single. She is thoroughly dreading the departure of her son Gustav, who’s about to start military service. She’s enraged by the official one-size-fits-all approach to mental health care. She is angry with Health Minister, and his zero tolerance goal for suicide, which she views as

unrealistic and inhumane. It’s tempting to lie down on the sofa and just give up.

But then the police ring at her door. And Freud creeps out of the sofa cushion.

The Angry Psychologist is a satirical novel in which the distance between supposed normality and insanity is wafer-thin.

'It´s entertaining to see someone 'loose it' completely.'

DAGBLADET ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE.

Synne Sun Løes (b. 1975) is based in Oslo. She debuted in 1999 with the book Yoko is alone. For her YA-novel, Eating Flowers for Breakfast (2002), she won the prestigious Brage Prize. She has been awarded Riksmålsprisen and been chosen as a White Raven author.

Rights sold to: Estonia (Esti Ramat)

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Excerpt from The Angry Phychologist:

I stood with the egg carton in one hand and dirt on the knees of my trousers. I took an egg out of the carton. A little white egg. I felt its heft in the palm of my hand. Stroked the cool, smooth shell with my thumb. I smiled at Zoe and Zoe smiled back. With a swift, firm movement, I drew back my arm, then flung it forward as fast as I could. I let go.

The eggs smashed against the door, their yellow yolks sliding across the glass, running down the shiny surface like fresh bird poo. I want to live, I thought as I carried on throwing.

I want to actually live. I want to practice therapy. Not pack people into small, square cardboard boxes and then label the boxes with their diagnoses. I don’t want to send the boxes from pillar to post. Return them with insufficient postage.

No. If I’d wanted a job as a package-packer or a post-person, I’d have got myself one. It wouldn’t have been especially demanding. But I wanted to be a psychologist. I am a psychologist.

No-one is going to take the conversations away from me. The patients. The time. The wonder. The humanity. The encounter.

The authentic and vulnerable. And that’s why I must throw these eggs. Crush them. Kill them.

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Selma Lønning Aarø

RIGHT TO PRIVACY An author wakes up in hospital.

Something dramatic has happened – she just can’t quite remember what.

What she can recall, however, is what happened before.

Privatlivets fred 130 x 205 mm / 346 pages

When the author moves to Fredrikstad from Oslo with her family, she finds new friends, a new life and what she hopes will be the starting-point for a new novel. Her new girlfriend X has given her permission to write whatever she wants about what they describe as a major issue that has marked X’s life. It looks set to be the author’s best novel ever, but X gradually becomes increasingly unstable and intimidating, and the author realises that her entire writing project is in jeopardy. The same goes for her artistic freedom, her finances, her relationship to her publisher and colleagues – not to mention the relationships in her own family. What can an author allow herself, and who really owns a story?

Selma Lønning Aarø’s new novel is funny, sometimes frightening and unusually topical.

A continuation of a strong feminist tradition, it also comments on the debate about reality literature.

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE. 'THIS FALL'S FUNNIEST NOVEL'  ADRESSEAVISA FUNNY AND SHARP-WITTED 'What is the ethical responsibility of an author? […]

Right to Privacy goes straight to the heart of this problem in a way that is both funny and thought-provoking.'

AFTENPOSTEN

NORL A SELECTED TITLE AUTUMN 2021

Selma Lønning Aarø (b. 1972) made her debut in 1995 with The Final story. She has been a newspaper columnist for Dagbladet and Klassekampen for a number of years. Her novel, I'm Coming, was translated into several languages. Her Lying Face is praised by critics and readers. Right to Privacy is her latest novel.

Rights sold to: Denmark (Straarup & co), France (Gallimard)

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Excerpt from Right to Privacy

To my surprise, the pain X spoke of made the same holes in me as Mum’s pain once had. I’d tried to fill them in, these holes. I’d filled them in with travel and childbirth, with fun and frivolity, but as X spoke, each of these holes seemed to open up again, as if a plaster had been ripped off a wound.

As X spoke, I was reduced to the same powerlessness I had experienced as a child. I felt the same anger I had felt as a child. X, who could fix pretty much anything, X, who went with the flow and did exactly what she felt like all the time, could not fix this. She was powerless and I didn’t want X to be powerless, just as I hadn’t wanted Mum to be either when I was younger. If I was meant to write anything at all, this was it. It was a peculiar feeling and when I left X that evening, I did the only thing I could do.

I went home across the bridge with the ever-present wind in my hair. My head grew cold and clear. I crept into my house and up the stairs and started to write.

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Iram Haq

UNLOVED Sofia is from Oslo, the child of Pakistani parents. She often has too little money and spends too much time on Tinder.

Sofia is awarded a grant to make photographic art but suspects she only got it because she’s brown.

When her father falls seriously ill, she starts to take pictures of him. And when an old flame comes to town, Sofia’s yearning for love intensifies.

A passionate affair ensues.

Unloved is driven by painful comedy and characters with an instinct for survival.

Uelsket 130 x 205 mm / 224 pages

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE. FUNNY, TENDER AND SEXY NOVEL 'Iram Haq´s debut novel is a great read!'

AFTENPOSTEN BRUTALLY HONEST 'Iram Haq proves herself as a steady builder of character, and that makes the book principally good. Sofia is frighteningly vivid. Iram Haq has written a novel that leaves marks.'  DAGBLADET 'This debut is amongst the very best this fall. […] A well composed narrative. […] Unloved is a nuanced family portrait that both wonders and rebels.'  STAVANGER AFTENBLAD

Iram Haq (b. 1976) has studied at Westerdal's School of Communication and works as an actress and director.

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Excerpt from Unloved

My name is Safia, but I’ve Norwegianized it to Sofia.

I’m 39 years old. I work as a photographer but also take random jobs here and there. Otherwise, I have a father, a mother and a cousin who I haven’t talked to in years. They’re originally from India, but in a nutshell: they were Pakistanis before they became Bangladeshis and then they became “new” Norwegians. I live in an area where you only see white people except at 7-Eleven and the Dollar General – but of course I don’t shop there. I’d rather walk an extra mile to a store where it’s too busy for anyone to ask if I know Urdu, like samosas, if I’m married to a white man or if I happen to come from the same place as them. Still single. Looking for a boyfriend. So let me know if you know a nice, friendly guy who I’d get along with. Preferably handsome, young, with good genes and who will love me forever. Know anyone?

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Ida Fjeldbraaten

WOLVERINE The main character in the novel Wolverine lives in an institution, working as a cleaner at the city zoo. She has an underdeveloped gaze at the world around her. She is closer to her basic instincts and drives than most of us, and she has to fight herself to restrain the fury and forcefulness raging inside of her.

In the Nordic nature area of the zoo, we meet the wolverine. The wolverine is among the most skilled survivors of the animal kingdom, but trapped as the weakest of his pack, the beast within him is cowed.

Jerv 130 x 205 mm / 128 pages

Wolverine is a novel about the animal in humans and the human in animals.

The novel examines zoos as a luxury.

What happens in a place like this when the society beyond its walls breaks down? Wolverine is a brutal, tender and compelling tale of bodily fluids, jaws, teeth, mud and bites; about nature, culture and about powers that reside in all of us – and can, perhaps, never be reined in.

NOMINATED TO THE P2 RADIO LISTENERS NOVELPRIZE 2020 AWARDED THE HALVORSEN TRUST PRIZE 2020 ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE ‘Ida Fjeldbraaten’s Wolverine is an unusually interesting debut.’

KLASSEKAMPEN ‘… The author has managed the feat of portioning out the disturbing elements, so that the reader feels mostly like a microwave oven, where the terror heats up from the inside.’

DAG OG TID Ida Fjeldbraaten (b. 1984) is the Creative Director of the Hausmann marketing bureau, and a marketing director of the small publisher Teori & praksis. Wolverine is her literary debut.

Rights sold to: Germany (Verlag Die Brotsuppe)

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Excerpt from Wolverine

I try licking the wounds clean, it tastes sour, musty and old, like a poisonous fungus. It tastes of danger, retreat, pounding heartbeats and gasping for breath.

FICT ION

The bite has made two holes in the lump, and the grey-yellow fluid is now running out like the viscous sap that oozes from trees in the spring. Like sap, it will soon thicken and become like resin, so chewy and sticky that it will plug the rest of the leaking fluid.

Beside the rock-pile, I lie back-to-back with my mother and rest for a while. She allows me to lie there, we recognize each other right now, Mother knows me, I'm in her body again, not yet out, not yet deformed, not yet rejected, not right now. I'm warm, soft inside, the lump less painful. I vanish into the warmth, the softness, into her. Stay. * I walk through the underpass, stroking my fingers along the wall’s rough surface and the small grooves cast into it. The sharp edges of the concrete and thin cement tiles sticking out almost grate your fingers. Not exactly painful, but almost. Maybe that's how most things are. Everything hurts, but if you touch something painful just gently it’s almost like a form of tickling.

I wait on the platform for the subway train. There’s no one here. No noise from the city, no cars, no people. On the opposite platform a dog slinks up to a rubbish bin, rears itself up on his hind legs, sticks his nose into the slot and tears out some paper. I recognize the dog, a brown, shaggy-haired Sussex Spaniel with eyes that look almost human. I like animals that do human things, but the animals I like the least are those that actually look like humans, and that dog looks like one of those old humans whose eyes are constantly watering.

The train is no doubt late. The screens that should display what time it’s due are just blank. I go back to looking at the dog.

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Lars Saabye Christensen

ECHOES OF THE CITY Book 4: Jesper and Trude

The fourth volume of Echoes of the City centres on Jesper Kristoffersen and Trude Hagen, whose destinies are closely bound to the city and the streets they live on, as well as Oslo’s other inhabitants.

Fagerborg and the world are shrinking, the pace of life has stepped up a notch: it is the 1980s and a new generation is taking over, a generation with the world at its feet. The tramlines bind the city together but also lead to places that take people out of the city – whether to Hurdal, Sweden or Lake Como.

Regardless of how different their dreams may be, their struggles place them at odds with the city and the world.

Byens spor – Jesper og Trude 130 x 205 mm / 464 pages

FULL ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS OF ECHOES OF THE CITY I AND II AVAILABLE

Lars Saabye Christensen (b. 1953) has published a number of novels, poetry and short story collections since his literary debut in 1976 with The Story of Gly. His breakthrough came with Beatles (1984), one of the greatest literary sales successes in Norway that, over the years, new generations continue to hold close to their hearts. He received the Nordic Council Literature Prize for The Half Brother in 2001.

Saabye Christensen has also received the Riverton Prize, the Critics' Prize, the Brage Prize, the Norwegian Booksellers' Prize, the Dobloug Prize and the Norwegian Reader's Prize. He has been published in 36 countries.

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ECHOES OF THE CITY I: Book 1: Ewald and Maj

ECHOES OF THE CITY II: Book 2: Maj

ECHOES OF THE CITY III: Book 3: The Shadow Book

272 60 0 COPI ES SOLD I N NORWAY

‘Lars Saabye Christensen allows himself digressions and diversions in the last novel in his Oslo trilogy Echoes of the City. This sets the three-volume work slightly off-kilter. Just what it takes to make the trilogy necessary.

Yes, necessary.’

NRK ‘Lars Saabye Christensen writes warming literature of reminiscence, full of linguistic treats.’

AFTENPOSTEN ‘It is gripping, in some passages glittering. And only a reader with a heart of steel could fail to be deeply moved…’

DAGBLADET

Rights sold to: Czech Republic (Kniha Zlin), Denmark (Grif), Germany (BTB Luchterhand), Poland (Literackie), Tunisia (Societe dar Meskeliani), UK (MacLehose Press)

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Vigdis Hjorth

IS MOTHER DEAD The protagonist of Is Mother Dead is an acclaimed artist, Johanna, who has spent three decades in the US with her husband and child. When her husband dies, she returns to Norway, where she is invited to put on a major retrospective.

What remains of the life she left behind in Norway several decades ago? What does she expect to find when she returns? How will she manage to build a bridge between past and present? We follow Johanna’s self-examination as well as her attempts to understand and come closer to her mother.

N O M I N AT ED TO T H E N O R D I C CO U N C I L S L I T T ER AT U R E Er mor død 130 x 205 mm / 368 pages

In this novel, Vigdis Hjorth digs deeper into the mother-daughter issue, once again writing compellingly and profoundly about a timeless theme.

P R IZ E 2021

‘Vigdis Hjorth's Is Mother Dead is a brooding and searching novel that proves why she is among our very best. The book resembles a thriller; the crescendo is edge-of-your-seat literature. Hjorth is an expert in plotting and linguistic rhythm. Long sections are broken up by pages with plenty of air and low-key reflections, several of which you will return to and read again and again.’

DAGENS NÆRINGSLIV ‘Vigdis Hjorth is back at her best, with a raw and painful book.

Brave and uncompromising.’

DAGSAVISEN FULL ENGLISH TRANSLATION AVAILABLE Vigdis Hjorth (b. 1959) has made an exciting literary career and has written many popular books for both children and adults. Today she is an awardwinning author and one of Norway's most interesting, contemporary writers. She has won a number of prizes and awards, amongst them: The Gyldendal Prize in 2011, the Critics Award in 2012, The Honorary Brage Award and the Amalie Skram Award in 2014, The Aschehoug Award in 2015 and the Booksellers Prize in 2016.

Rights sold to: Croatia (Naklada Ljevak), Denmark (Turbine), Finland (Schildts & Söderströms), Greece (Potamos) Sweden (Natur & Kultur), United Kingdom (Verso), United States (Verso Books), Italy (Fazi Editore), Russia (EKSMO Publishing House), Spain (Nórdica Libros), Hungary (Polar Egyesület), Norway (Den Nationale Scene)

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Vigdis Hjorth

WILL AND TESTAMENT A classic story of inheritance, centred on two summer cabins on Hvaler.

Two children have been looking after the place and their parents for many years.

They are due to inherit the cabins. But there are two other children, who have partly broken away from the family. How do they fit into the inheritance dispute?

During the inheritance discussions another story emerges which brings violent forces into play. It's all about family history.

Will and Testament is a powerful novel, which created great debate when it was first published in 2016.

WINNER OF THE NORWEGIAN BOOK­SELLERS AWARD AND THE NORWEGIAN CRITICS AWARD IN 2016.

Arv og miljø 130 x 205 mm / 352 pages

WINNER OF THE NORWEGIAN CRITICS PRIZE 2016.

NOMINATED TO THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARD 2019.

NOMINATED TO THE NORDIC COUNCILS LITERATURE PRIZE 2016.

FULL ENGLISH TRANSLATION AVAILABLE.

Rights sold to: Azerbaijan (Qanun Publishing House), Bulgaria (Aviana), Croatia (Ljevak), Denmark (Turbine), Estonia (Eesti Raamat), Faroe Islands (Sprotin Forlag), Finland (Schildts & Söderströms), France (Actes Sud), Germany (Osburg Verlag), Hungary (Polar Egyesület), Italy (Fazi Editore), Lithuania (Alma Littera), Netherlands (Ambo Anthos), Norway (Den Nationale Scene), Poland, Russia (EKSMO), Spain (Nórdica Libros), Sweden (Natur & Kultur), Turkey (Siren Yayinlari), United Kingdom (Verso Books), United States (Verso Books), Brazil (Harper Collins), Egypt (Al-Karma), Greece (Habibbutz Publishers), Portugal (Porto Editora), Romania (Grupul Editorial Art), Serbia (STRIK Publishing House), South Korea (GU-FIC)

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Roy Jacobsen

ONLY A MOTHER Return to Barrøy!

After a long journey through Norway, Ingrid has finally returned to Barrøy. Life has become more stable, but the war still casts its long shadows across the country.

Former collaborators face cold shoulders or obscured retaliation. Others simply wish to leave the painful years in the past.

Bare en mor 130 x 205 mm / 279 pages

One day a boy arrives on the island.

Shortly thereafter, his father disappears.

Ingrid assumes responsibility for the boy, and adopts him. As such, Mathias becomes a central part of the Barrøy community, together with Kaja, Ingrid’s daughter by birth. Life on the island is demanding, but the letters from friends in Oslo and Trondheim tell of a Norwegian society undergoing dramatic changes. Which stories should Ingrid keep to herself, and which ones should she bring to light?

What kind of future is she imagining?

Only A Mother is the fourth book in a series of novels that have delighted readers in Norway and abroad. It’s a novel about being a parent, being a part of a community, and about living under conditions that require hard labour. It is also a story about parts of our near past that have stayed in the dark. And it’s about an unusual woman, who has to navigate painful experiences in a rough, weather-beaten, and diverse society on the coast of Northern Norway.

‘Roy Jacobsen has added a new chapter to his masterpiece …’

NETTAVISEN ‘It is a pure pleasure to read Roy Jacobsen’s novel Only a Mother. …keeps the reader captivated from the first to the last sentence.’

DAGBLADET ‘… a beautiful and intense novel. …poetic, virtuoso, warm …No one describes the coastal and cultural history of the Helgeland coast as Roy Jacobsen.’

VG Rights sold to: Czech Republic (Pistorins & Olsanská), Denmark (Gyldendal), Estonia (Eesti Raamat), France (Editions Gallimard), Germany (C.H. Beck Verlag), Poland (Wydawnictwo Poznanskie), Sweden (Norstedts), UK (MacLehose Press), Italy (Iperborea S.r.l.), Iceland (Forlagið), Finland (Sitruuna kustannus Oy), Lithuania (Lithuanian Writer's Union)

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Photo: Maja Hattvang

Roy Jacobsen (b. 1954) is regarded as one of the most influential contemporary authors in Norway, and has since his sensational debut in 1982, with the short story collection Prison Life, which won him the prestigious Tarjei Vesaas’ Debutant Prize, developed into an original and daring author with a special interest in the underlying psychological interplay in human relationships. He has been nominated three times for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, and twice for the Nordic Council Literature Prize. In 2017 he was shortlisted for both the Man Booker International Prize, as the first Norwegian author ever, and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, for The Unseen.

In 2013 Jacobsen’s authorship reached a new milestone with the publication of The Unseen, book one in his now completed Barrøy trilogy. It is set in the first half of the 20th century on an island on the North-Western coast of Norway, and is a monument over human courage and life-saving practical and social knowledge. White Shadow followed in 2015, and The Eyes of Rigel was published in 2017. The Barrøy trilogy became an immediate critically acclaimed sales success, it has been translated into 28 languages, and has sold nearly 500.000 copies in Norway alone. In total, Jacobsen has been translated into 36 languages.

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Roy Jacobsen

THE UNSEEN This novel is set in the first half of the 20th Century on the island Barrøy. The island is small, there is only space for Ingrid’s family. Life on the island is difficult and the Barrøy family is poor, but certainly not without guts and skills. They live off of their small land, they have some livestock, they fish in the sea and make use of whatever the waves wash ashore.

De usynlige 130 x 205 mm / 256 pages

The dramatic ocean and the seasonal changes make for a plot in itself. Roy’s descriptions of man and nature are breath taking. The family’s love for their environment is brilliantly communicated.

A life somewhere else is unthinkable to them. This is their paradise on Earth.

The Barrøy family is depicted with great wisdom, sensitivity and narrative skill.

Roy turns their practical knowledge into little gems of stories with metaphorical and existential depth.

FULL ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS AVAILABLE FOR ALL THREE BOOKS. RIGHTS SOLD TO 31 TERRITORIES. SHORTLISTED TO THE BOOKER INTERNATIONAL PRIZE. SHORTLISTED TO THE DUBLIN INTERNATIONAL LITERATURE PRIZE.

Rights sold to: Azerbaijan (Qanun Publishing House), Bulgaria (Aviana), Canada (Biblioasis), China (Writers Publishing House), Czech Republic (Pistorius & Olšanská), Denmark (Rosinante & Co), Estonia (Eesti Raamat), Faroe Islands (Sprotin Forlag), Finland (Sitruuna kustannus Oy), France (Éditions Gallimard), Germany (C. H. Beck), Greece, Hungary (Scolar Kiado), Iceland (Forlagið), Israel (Keter Books), Italy (Iperborea), Lithuania (Lithuanian Writers’ Union Publishing House), Macedonia (Shkupi), Netherlands (Uitgeverij De Bezige Bij), Poland (Wydawnictwo Poznanskie sp. z o.o.), Portugal (Relógio D’Água Editores), Republic Of Korea (Fiftyone K. Inc. Zhan publishing), Slovenia (VBZ), Spain (Alianza Editorial, S.A.), Sweden (Norstedts), Syrian Arab Republic (Mamdouh), Turkey (Yapi Kredi Kültür Sanat Yay. Ticaret ve Sanayi A.S.), United Kingdom (MacLehose Press), Norway (Hålogoland Teater), Russia (Izdatelstvo Albus Korvus)

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Reviews for The Unseen: ‘… as blunt as it is subtle and is ­easily among the best books I have ever read. … There is a unique universality about The Unseen. Jacobsen's prose is beautiful, clean, poised and plain speaking, but there are interludes of Shakespearean grandeur in the dazzling descriptions of storms.’

THE IRISH TIMES Reviews for White Ocean: ‘He is the master of the coastal folk, Roy Jacobsen, a virtuoso, poetic portrayer of coastal culture – with its fish, boat crews and practical ­activities. … The novel is safe in the hands of a novelist who commands a wonderfully beautiful language and has a poetic power. The dialogue and the powerful expressions in local dialect create authenticity. The chapters and scene after scene are rounded off with elegance and finesse.

Roy Jacobsen masters the short format. A joy for heart and soul.’

VG  ‘Roy Jacobsen is a true storyteller; with his capacity to give the reader both overview and detail in the same image – without losing perspective. … In White Ocean, life is portrayed with both beauty and brutality.’

BERGENS TIDENDE  Reviews for The Eyes of Rigel: ‘Roy Jacobsen’s third novel about Ingrid Barrøy is a beautiful, poetic and at times brutal story. The entire little but great novel gives a tantalizing picture of life after the Great War, life after the catastrophe, life after love. Read it yourself, this exceptionally beautiful voyage from the ocean to the wooded inlands and back, amongst people with visible and invisible scars, war within peace.’

VG  ‘Jacobsen’s images of a society in rapid development, is as sharp and ­detailed as his pictures of nature, woods, bird song and the absence of the ocean – in what becomes Ingrid Barrøy´s peculiar journey. This book is a highlight!’

NRK ‘When I close the book I think – like I always do with Jacobsen; Damned, how good he is!’

DAGBLADET

FICT IO N

Edgar Burås

ALFRED 2.0 Elias is fleeing east from what was once Norway. The authorities are after him again because most robots are either slaves or prohibited. Elias likes the digital beings as much as anyone else and doesn’t think they should have to die because they want to be free. That is why he hopes to find “the wonderful place”, the small enclave where cybernetic organisms can live in peace. But in 2131, the world lies in ruins and chaos. It is difficult to find food, and acid rains down from the sky.

Alfred 2.0 130 x 205mm / 128 pages

Such times of crisis make strange bedfellows. Elias finds friendship with Lilac, a rebellious robot who is also on the run, and Alfred, a fully digitised, sentient house program who is temporarily loaded into teddy bear.

Alfred 2.0 is a wonderful new science fiction novel from a master of the genre, and an exciting and gripping story.

Edgar Burås grew up in the Belgian Congo as the child of Norwegian missionaries. Burås worked as a teacher for several years, but Malaria forced him into early retirement in 2009.

Mathias Nyhagen Asplund

WALKING HOME In a merciless tale told in meticulous language reminiscent of both Faulkner and Fosse, Asplund writes the story of a young man called Halvor who is trying to find his way home.

Vandre heim 125 x 200 mm / 96 pages

Halvor has been fighting the war at sea and now plans to return home to his pregnant wife. He walks across mountains and through valleys, he meets a woman and a man carrying their son’s coffin, he meets two friends who have left the city to “be free”, and he is coaxed into the home of a young woman and her mother, who needs a man to help her. They tell him that there is a bear in the area, and that the bear is vicious. The road home is long, and on it Halvor encounters tragedy, temptation, kindness and mortal peril.

Mathias Nyhagen Asplund (b. 1988) lives in London, where he writes, auditions and acts in various theater productions.

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FICT IO N

Eivind Buene

CONFIRMATION How can you be a good dad when you only ever see your daughter for a few days at a time? Is it possible to put your differences aside and come together as a family again when your daughter is getting confirmed and a big party is being thrown in her honour?

It’s late summer, and Endre is alone at the cabin with the boat. Long mornings tripping out to the mouth of the fjord, quiet days living as he pleases. He knows he’ll soon have to return to the city, to work—and for Emma’s confirmation.

Years have passed since he and Emma’s mother split up. Have they co-parented well enough over the years? Have they managed to give their daughter, Emma, a good life? Can Endre say that he’s done his best as a part-time father?

Confirmation is raw, tender and exploratory.

Konfirmasjon 130 x 205 mm / 160 pages

Eivind Buene (b. 1973) is the author of a number of books and works as a freelance composer. His music has been performed in several prestigious venues.

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FICT IO N

Kjersti Kollbotn

PERSISTENT WEAK LAYERS Persistent Weak Layers is a term used for a phenomenon that occurs in snow and that can potentially lead to avalanches. The remarkable thing about this phenomenon is that these layers can be buried deep down in the snow and therefore be invisible. Not surprisingly, this is also what makes them so dangerous.

Vedvarande svake lag 130 x 205 mm

Emil is on a springtime ski trip in the mountains. Weather conditions during the season have left the mountainsides unstable and there are persistent weak layers in the snow beneath him. Internally, Emil also has persistent weak layers of his own. These two circumstances combine to unfortunate effect.

Kjersti Kollbotn’s writing has never shied away from tough topics – and the same applies to this book.

Kjersti Kollbotn (b. 1959) is from Nordfjord and lives in Tromsø. She has a doctorate in Engineering from NTNU. Persistent Weak Layers is her latest novel.

Astrid Nordang

ANITA (53)

Anita (53) 130 x 205 mm / 358 pages

Anita (53) is funny, modern and topical. Anita’s 15-year-old son says he wants to transition. Anita (53) herself is menopausal and experiencing violent hormone fluctuations, hot flushes and increased libido.

The day before Anita (53) is due to travel to Rome for work, her son says: ‘Mum, I want to become a woman’. He is 15 years old and determined to transition. Has he started taking hormone blockers?

She travels to Rome to live at the collective-like Norwegian Institute and write an essay about opera diva Maria Callas and filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini, who became lovers and confidants during the filming of Medea.

Alongside the entertaining story of Anita’s days in Rome, we are told the beautiful, painful and poetic story of Maria Callas and Pier Paolo Pasolini.

Astrid Nordang (b. 1964) holds a cand. philol degree. She has also worked as an actress and playwright with several independent theater groups, as an editor and as a translator, and has written a number of novels in the past.

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FICT IO N

Frida Andersen

IN CASE OF FIRE Selma is the best and the worst. She can hardly go anywhere without Selma. Selma is like her closest friend and worst enemy rolled into one. Selma is a voice that follows her almost constantly. Even to the psychologist’s office. She dreads team building at work, and at the very least with drinks afterwards. She would rather sit at home and eat bread rolls with her mom and dad. Without Selma.

With a unique doggedness and intensity, Andersen writes about a young woman who has her boundaries pushed in a disturbing way. Andersen’s second novel, In Case of Fire, is about bad influence, boundaries, breakdowns, self-love and possibly even new love.

I tilfelle brann 130 x 205 mm

Frida Andersen (b. 1994) lives in Oslo. In Case of Fire is her second novel.

Sophia Saenger

NOTHING HERE BELONGS TO ME Hun har begynt på videregående, men sliter med å finne seg til

rette. Det finnes én person som ser Thea for den hun er, nemlig vikarlæreren Kathinka.

Kathinka inviterer Thea med på café, tilbyr henne sigaretter, gir

henne klær og en sølvring. Og, etter hvert, en massasje. Hva er det

Sophia Saenger

THEA ER 15 ÅR GAMMEL , har skilte foreldre og føler seg utenfor.

A student. A teacher.

First the teacher offers the student a cigarette. Then they go to a café. Sneak off school grounds, taking care not to be seen. The teacher offers the student a bag of stylish clothes.

A silver ring with blue stones. The student accepts, says thank you. The teacher gives the student a massage. And suddenly the student is sitting in the teacher’s living room being asked whether she wants to stay the night.

The student’s name is Thea, and she is 15 years old. Her parents are divorced, she feels alienated unable to connect.

The teacher’s name is Kathinka.

Following the gradual escalation of the relationship between Thea and Kathinka is disquieting. But because Kathinka isn’t a man, we—perhaps—read her differently and judge her less harshly.

Sophia Saenger

Kathinka vil med Thea? Og hvilke konsekvenser får det for henne å

Ingenting her tilhører meg er Sophia Saengers debutroman. I den

vil leseren finne en sår og kompleks beretning om hva som kan skje med et ungt sinn når grenser blir lekt med og flyttet på.

ISBN 978-82-02-74263-8

www.cappelendamm.no

Ingenting her tilhører meg_742638.indd 1

Ingenting her tilhører meg

bli sett for første gang av en som tøyer grensene for det akseptable?

Sophia Saenger (f. 1989)

er født og oppvokst i Oslo, og bosa

i Drammen. Hun har en mastergrad i religionshistorie fra Universitetet

Oslo. Romanen Ingenting her tilhør

Ingenting her tilhører meg

meg er hennes første bok.

Forfatterfoto: Anna-Julia Granberg/Blunderbuss Omslagsillustrasjon: (portrett) Vladimir Sazonov/Shutterstock

Ingenting her tilhører meg 130 x 205 mm / 224 pages

Sophia Saenger (b. 1989) grew up in Oslo and now lives in Drammen.

She has a master’s degree in history of religions from the University of Oslo. The novel Nothing Here Belongs to Me is her first book.

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FL A M M E FO RL AG

Nora Eide

CONSEQUENTIAL ERROR Imagine that you want a child with your partner, but you can’t. Not in the usual way. But medical science has come a long way. Very long. We can give you a clone instead. If you want a daughter, we clone the mother. For a son, we clone the father.

A clone?

A clone. Identical in every way.

In every way?

In Nora Eide’s new novel we follow a family that appears quite ordinary, in a world that also appears quite ordinary.

This is a novel with sci-fi elements, a thriller about a family, an unpleasant description of what is supposed to be life’s biggest miracle: a child.

Følgefeil

Nora K. Eide (b. 1987) was born in Trondheim and now lives in Oslo. She made her debut in 2017 with the short story collection Your Family (Familen din).

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FL A M M E FO RL AG

Arild Rossebø

THE LAST POTATO DUMPLING One day we will all die. Generally, our parents die before us. Sometimes they die suddenly, sometimes we get the chance to say goodbye. Sometimes the dying person does not talk about the fact that it will soon be over. Even one’s own family sometimes won’t say that it is the end. Sometimes in life, ones’ father may be dead without you knowing.

In Arild Rossebø’s debut novel The Last Potato Dumpling we get to know a grown son – who, in the beginning of the book, follows his mother through her last days, before we later see him in his father’s funeral. Within a short period of time, both his parents are gone.

But his father actually disappeared many years ago.

Den siste komle 130 x 205 mm / 104 pages

The Last Potato Dumpling is the story about a family and everything that happened when the family was dissolved. It is also a story about food and traditions, about being a little boy and a grown man.

Arild Rossebø (b. 1974) has skated almost his whole life. He has also been working as a teacher at a Waldorf School. Rossebø studied at the Creative Writing Academy in Hordaland and at the Writers’ College in Bø.

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FL A M M E FO RL AG

Morten Langeland

FIFTY/FIFTY Morten Langeland’s new novel Fifty/Fifty is about an author who sits in the library of the new National Museum, struggling to write an essay about the typical Norwegian kindness in Tarjei Vesaas’ authorship. During a break in his work he becomes aware of a skater who repeatedly, over several days, tries to pull off a 50/50 – grind down the rail outside the museum.

The novel is about rehab, about not giving up and about self-care through the love for others.

Fifty/Fifty 130 x 205 mm

Morten Langeland (b. 1986) had his debut in 2012. In 2016 he was awarded the Stig Sæterbakken Memorial Award for promising young writers.

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FL A M M E FO RL AG

Morten Langeland

NAILS IN MOURNING After what was supposed to be a short get-together by the river before dusk, two good friends manage to bring home a freshly caught salmon by a funny coincidence. They have no other choice but to prepare the salmon on a whim and spontaneously invite a bunch of people over for dinner. The invitation is quite random and widely spread, on a firstcome, first-served basis which will set the tone for the rest of the night.

Nails in Mourning is a novel in which a large and spawning mature salmon not only forms the economic basis for the story, but also in a way forms the value basis for the way the text develops.

Sørgerender 130 x 205 mm

To belong or to fall behind, to live or to exist, to be included or to be in a 'condition of secrecy'– thats's what this weird, demanding and yet deeply captivating novel is about.  FÆDELANDSVENNEN A LITTERARY FEAST 'The wordstream Nails in mourning is rich and satisfying. I reccomend grabbing a slice.'

VÅRT LAND

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FL A M M E FO RL AG

Heidi Furre

THE POWER ‘Quite often I can tell by just looking at a person. I don't know exactly how I can tell, it´s something fleeting. It lives in the face. It´s in the skin, around the mouth, in the eyes. Some women carry pain in their face. It´s hard to get a grip on it, it easily slips away. It is despite of youth, despite of beauty. I have seen it in others since I was a child, before I could tell what it was. I have seen it in children. I have seen it in old women. Some days I have seen it in myself.

In my pores, the tone of my skin, the lines.

If I am not careful it comes pouring out.’

Makta 130 x 205 mm / 144 pages

Liv is a nurse. She takes good care of herself and others. She is a normal person hiding a normal secret. One night, many years ago, she was raped. By a man she willingly followed home. The Power is a novel about power, but also a book about having the power. The Power to move on.

‘The Power is a concrete story about Liv’s experiences, and a story about how many women feel every time they step out of the bus on their way home late at night, having to walk the last stretch alone in the dark.’

MORGENBLADET ‘On point about trauma relief … In Heidi Furre’s hard-hitting novel The Power, a mother tries to take back control over her own life. … What has happened cannot be undone. Nor will this borderline rape end up in court. But Heidi Furre has found another form of relief through her accurate formulations.

Formulations that will hit home with the reader.’

NRK NORL A SELECTED TITLE AU T U M N 2021 Heidi Furre (b. 1986) made her debut 2013 with the novel The Paris Syndrome, to critical acclaim. She has since written two more novels. In addition to her writing, Heidi spends the majority of her time working as a photographer.

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Excerpt from The Power I wrote the letter. Sat in the changing room at the gym, wanting to be on neutral ground. It was hard to find the words; I wasn’t sure if I was expressing myself correctly.

At first I wrote non-consensual sex, it was okay to write that. But it didn’t seem right, because it wasn’t sex. If sex is a mutual act, it wasn’t sex. I wrote sexualised violence, I wrote assault, I wrote sexual trauma, but nothing seemed right. There was too little violence or too little sex. Deep down I knew which word to use, I just couldn’t bring myself to write it. Couldn’t face that word, that fucking lousy word. Rape. I wrote rape.

FL A M M E FO RL AG

Linn Strømsborg

NEVER, EVER, EVER «I am 35 years old. I do not want children.

It’s not something I talk to other people about. It is something that I am ashamed of, a topic I avoid; take long verbal detours around. When my friends talk about having kids, I change the topic. I do not want to be to certain or unbending, because I might suddenly wake up one day and find that I have become one of them, an ordinary woman in her thirthies wanting to get pregnant, wanting a family, wanting to expand my life, my body and my heart to make room for more than myself. You are allowed to change your mind.»

The main character in Linn Strømsborg´s novel Never, ever, ever has never wanted children. She has been living with Philip for eight years, and they have agreed to not have children – up until now.

Aldri, aldri, aldri Because maybe Philip might want to 130x205 mm / 224 pages become a dad after all? And while her two best friends are expecting their first child, and her mother is constantly nagging about grandchildren, and her everyday life is full of parents with toddlers and births and the struggle of others to have enough time for it all, she is firm in her life and her choice about not having children.

Never, ever, ever is a novel about why we have children, and why we do not have children. It is the story about choosing something other than what is expected of you, but at the same time wanting a normal life.

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE ‘The story is elegantly composed, at times cinematic. Strømsborg has written rare and energized prose about a timely and somewhat taboo topic.’

VG  Linn Strømsborg (b. 1986) made her debut 2009 with the novel Roskilde, the story of a group of young people at a music festival, and followed up with the chap book The Øya Festival in the same year. She has since written two novels about the main character Eva; Furuset in 2012 and You're not gonna die in 2016.

She is one of the most interesting young voices in contemporary Norwegian fiction today.

Rights sold to: Denmark (Turbine), Serbia (Cigoja Stampa), Germany (DuMont)

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FL A M M E FO RL AG

Lotta Elstad

I REFUSE TO THINK I Refuse to Think has much of the same sharp and smart humour as Lotta Elstad's earlier books.

We meet Hedda Møller after a traumatic plane landing and hazardous journey back to Oslo, through a Europe in crisis, on buses and trains, dirty hostel rooms and a one-night stand in Berlin that will not stop sending her messages in CAPS LOCK. Back home she discovers that she is unwantedly pregnant. That should be an easily solved problem. It´s not.

I Refuse to Think is a dark, feministic contemporary comedy about p ­ olitics, love – and an abyss that is getting ­dangerously closer.

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE ‘A feminist direct hit!’

STAVANGER AFTENBLAD 

Jeg nekter å tenke 130x205 mm / 240 pages

‘Lotta Elstads energy, wittiness and precision makes I Refuse to Think to one of this year's most enjoyable reads.

Within its comical genre, it is absolutely perfect; stimulating, exciting, funny, sharp – and somewhat dark.’

FÆDRELANDSVENNEN  ‘Lotta Elstad has written a novel that is funny, even if it is political. Elstad writes with energy and good timing. The suspense lasts until the last chapter.’

DAGSAVISEN ‘Lotta Elstad creates observing and fresh comedy out of the unwanted pregnancy of a freelancer. There has not been a lot of room for the easy going in Norwegian contemporary literature. Lotta Elstad clears the space for this kind of writing.

That is why it is so easy to let yourself be excited by her novels.’

MORGENBLADET Lotta Elstad (b. 1982) is a writer, journalist, historian and non-fiction editor. She has since her debut in 2008 published several acclaimed books, both narrative non-fiction and novels.

Rights sold to: Denmark (Hoff & Poulsen), France (Marabout), Germany (Kiepenheuer & Witsch), Netherlands (Uitgeverij Prometheus), Romania (Casa Cartii)

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U PLI T

Siri Østli

THE CHRISTMAS CALENDAR During breakfast on a totally ordinary Tuesday, Fie's husband abruptly tells her that he wants a divorce and tells her to move out. He is a dentist, and for years Fie has as well as being his wife been his faithful assistant - without pay. Now she is banished to an both impractical and uncharming attic apartment on the other side of the city. Dazed and in despair that her life has been turned up-side down, Fie tries to soften the blow with sedatives. Her grown up son is embarrassed about his mother break down and does not answer his phone.

Adventskalenderen 130 x 205 mm / 352 pages

Fie's sister Sara is the one who takes charge in the situation and demand that Fie get a grip of the situation. To speed things up, she gives Fie a challenging Christmas Calendar with new tasks every day leading up to Christmas. And with this, despair turns into an adventurous, at times overwhelming but in the end pretty nice advent after all!

The Christmas Calendar is a charming and touching Christmas book from the Norwegian queen of feelgood!

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILABLE

Siri Østli is married with five daughters and a university degree in French, Russian and Psychology.

She debuted with Across Greenland in High Heels in 2009, and has since then received excellent reviews on a number of feelgood novels. The Christmas Calendar is her latest book, and it takes her authorship in a more uplit direction.

Rights sold to: Denmark (Turbine), Italy (Garzanti, Srl.), Germany (Bastei Lübbe)

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Excerpt from The Christmas Calendar Like most Christmas gnomes, the gnome had a red hat, a red jacket, red trousers and an unfeasibly bushy beard. It was a rather ordinary, tacky plastic Christmas gnome, where it sat atop a pile of red crepe paper. Its girth made up for any lack of stature. But what Fie noticed, first and foremost, was the eyes. The steely eyes, staring at her, looking straight into her own, which were glazed. The eyes reminded her more than anything of her grandmother, her father’s mother, but also all the janitors, teachers, aunts, and others who had ever nailed her with strict, judgemental eyes as she writhed in shame as a child.

“Is that any way to behave?” the shopping centre gnome said. “Look at yourself! You should be ashamed!”

She immediately felt the need to defend herself, to explain that she had good reason to be sitting here, on a window ledge, without make-up on, with greasy hair and none-too-clean clothes.

She wanted to say: “It’s not my fault.”

And then: Did the gnome think he looked any better himself ? There were quality gnomes with knitted clothes and beards of real wool.

Dignified gnomes. Gnomes with real shoes, not just some kind of black plastic cover pulled over plastic feet. Though Fie doubted there were even feet inside.

But even in the state she was in, she realised she shouldn’t sit here and argue with a gnome. She understood that her urge to shout at the gnome stemmed from the fact that she recognised – with some reluctance – he was right. And finally, it dawned on her that the anger she felt was nothing short of a miracle.

She hadn’t felt the impulse to argue with anyone for ages. What was the point? Nothing had meant anything as long as she was left in peace with her pills and could sleep away the days. This anger, this need to justify herself, was the first glimmer of light in what had felt like an eternity of dark fog.

Fie winked, and in her mind, the Christmas gnome winked back.

U PLI T

Jorid Mathiassen

WHERE THE WHITE LILIES GROW Hjartøy, Nordland, 2009: Linnea needs to get out of Oslo after a relationship ends. She accepts her friend Iris’ offer to stay in the old house that had once belonged to her great-aunt Marie.

Linnea knows nothing of what awaits her when she arrives in Hjartøy in the middle of winter, and the challenges are unending. One day, she finds a small clock that puts her on the trail of a dramatic story from World War II. Rynes, Nordland, 1942: A young girl named Marie is wrenched away from her safe life on Hjartøy when her older sister needs help. Her sister is married and lives on a farm in Rynes some miles to the north.

Der hvite liljer vokser 130 x 205 mm

Right next to the farm is a German prison camp where Serbian soldiers are living in terrible conditions. But in the midst of all the atrocities, love blossoms when Marie meets a young prisoner named Jovan. They both know it could mean death if their relationship is revealed, and Jovan decides to flee to Sweden. This proves to have dramatic consequences.

As Linnea finds out more and more about Marie, her own life also takes a new turn.

Jorid Mathiassen (b. 1965) grew up on the Helgeland coast up north, and now lives in Oslo. She has a major in Nordic language and literature from the University of Oslo and has the last ten years worked as a publishing editor at Cappelen Damm, and currently at Strawberry Publishing. Prior to being a publishing editor, she worked as a journalist in the magazine Bok & samfunn. Where the White Lilies Grow is her debut novel.

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Excerpt from Where White Lilies Grow As soon as Marie finished washing the cups, she snuck out and started running toward the river. They’d heard shots coming from the camp earlier in the day, and she could hear the voice in her head saying it was more dangerous than ever to be wandering around outside, that the guards were being more watchful and that she was putting herself, the others in the house, and Jovan – if he was still alive – in even greater danger. Still, she ran and ran until she could taste blood. […]

She stopped as she approached their hiding place and slowly crept forward, looking around cautiously. The thought of the hateful face of the Norwegian guard who’d stopped her the first time still frightened her. She held her breath in total silence. Her heart was pounding and she closed her eyes for a few seconds. When she opened them again, she saw the top of his head sticking out of the pit he’d made for them that was almost completely covered with branches. She let out her breath again and the relief flowed through her whole body like a waterfall.

U PLI T

Annicken R. Day

FLY, BUTTERFLY Maya Williams is an ambitious, hard­ working New York Business Woman, stymied on her way up the corporate ladder by sexist, male executives. But when she is sent to a conference in Hawaii and expected to lie on stage, she does the unthinkable – she tells the truth. After the event she has a break down on the beach, and then decides to stay in Kauai´i for a few days. After all: she was just fired.

In Kauai´i she meets people who open her eyes to different ways of thinking and being, she begins to see life, work, love – and her self – in a whole new light. She learns how to chill, to breathe and to be more in the moment. All of a sudden she has a vision of wanting a life that might be totally different from what she thought.

Fly, sommerfugl 130 x 205 mm / 320 pages

When Maya returns to the corporate world as an executive, can she implement her new philosophies and still succeed? And will her personal and professional metamorphosis ultimately bring her the happiness and freedom that she dreams of?

‘Fly, Butterfly is a page turner that draws you in and makes you nod furiously, laugh deeply and then sob with empathy. This is a powerful novel that has the energy to inspire change.’

AMY BRANN, Author of Engaged, Make Your Brain Work and Neuroscience for Coaches.

‘Annicken R. Day has a gift for transforming bureaucrazies into businesses that buzz with creativity and joy. With her debut novel, she shows that she also has a knack for crafting stories about transforming ourselves.’

ADAM GRANT, New York Times bestselling author of Originals and Give and Take.

Annicken R. Day has worked with corporate culture for more than 20 years, i.e. as President of Culture at Norwegian Tandberg, and Cisco. Since 2012, she has been running her own company, Corporate Spring, where she leads her team in helping leaders and teams all over the world in building great places of employments and engaged corporate cultures. She is also a globally renowned public speaker, having written articles for Huffington Post and Business Insider, and co-authored the book Creative Superpowers. Her first novel, Fly, Butterfly, is a story that in many ways reflect Annicken's own experiences, philosophy of life and personal choices: Choosing the heart over the head, trust over fear, and keeping the courage to live one's own life on one's own terms. When Annicken is not travelling, she splits her time between Norway and California.

Rights sold to: Germany (Suhrkamp/Insel Verlag)

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FULL ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS AVAILABLE

CRI M E / T H RI LLER

Hilde S. Palladino

HIDDEN UNDER SNOW Hidden under snow is a character-driven psychological crime fiction novel.

Therapist Bjørk Isdahl is witness to the brutal suicide of one of her former clients – Azora. Among Azora’s possessions was a photograph of Bjørk, with the words ‘I know why you have nightmares’ written on it. Bjørk has always had terrible nightmares – nightmares she’s never mentioned to anyone else. So how could Azora have known about them, and why did she have that photo of Bjørk? Both the police and Bjørk search for the link between them. A link that connects the two and their lives more closely than Bjørk was even aware of herself.

Den som frykter snøen 130 x 205 mm

This work of psychological crime fiction is a fascinating dive into repressed memory and how the past and one’s upbringing can shape and impact them – even if they don’t remember it.

Hilde Palladino (b. 1968) is a former student of Norway’s Crime Writer’s School and lives between Oslo and Bali.

Self-employed, she runs various companies’ social media channels. Hidden under snow is her first crime novel.

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Excerpt from Hidden under snow Annoyed that I let myself get coaxed outside, I find my cell to see if she has called again or sent a text I’ve missed. Nothing. Most likely she forgot about me after the call ended, perhaps she fell asleep while high some minutes later. I picture her on a filthy sofa, meager and indifferent. Her face robbed of personality. Eyes unnaturally far sunk back into the eye sockets. Why the hell did I say yes to meeting her? I turn on my heel, about to leave, but I change my mind. People like her have a rough time. It won’t kill me to wait for a bit.

Remains of today’s rain still hang in the air, the fog thick against the rooftops. I start pacing back and forth, pulling my coat tighter about me, rubbing my hands together and blowing into the hollow between my palms. Fuck how I hate this time of year. If Azora doesn’t show within ten minutes, I’m gone.

I push the feeling of irritation away from me. Tasting her name while gravel and rotten leaves scrape beneath my boots. Was Azora just a name she went by, or her given name? I can’t recall. Have to admit, I haven’t spared her a thought in all these years. Still, it’s no wonder she’s found my number this time. My face has been on the front pages more times than I can count in the last year. As the nation’s most hated woman.

A feeling of being watched hits me. I can’t put my finger on what it is, but I glance up towards the office windows, feeling a prickling sensation on my neck. Turn around, forcing my eyes shut before staring further up to the rooftops, following the edge all the way round. Has she gone up there? I suddenly imagine seeing a shadow, but it’s probably just reflections in the haze. Possibly a cat, or pigeons taking cover for the night. Still, my pulse quickens. I shouldn’t be here. Not in this neighborhood, not alone.

Especially not during this time of day.

When the lights in the window go out, the back alley goes dark. I take a few steps backwards, feeling my legs wobble. I become increasingly aware of the sweet smells.

Of the sound of a tire sliding over wet pavement in the distance. Still keeping my eyes fastened to the top of the building. There is no movement up there now. Only the metallic, grey fog drifting past.

I wait.

Listen.

Get ready to leave.

And then it’s back, that feeling of being watched. Have I been set up here to be mugged? Is someone after me, because of everything that happened last year? I scan the office windows systematically, searching for silhouettes. Dig out my cell and conclude that Azora’s not coming. Glance up towards the roof one last time, listening for signs that I’m not alone.

I’m headed towards the archway again when I hear it. The scream tearing through the darkness, through the body. An inhuman scream of terror, followed by a thin gust of air, waving in the wind. It comes from above. I don’t have the time to question what’s happening, I just whirl around, looking up. I see the figure falling, spinning around, and crashing on the ground just yards away from me.

CRI M E

Sigbjørn Mostue

THE SILENT SAVANNAH The Silent Savannah is the sequel to Sigbjørn Mostue’s nail-biting, Riverton Prize-nominated thriller The heavens will weep blood in which we met the series hero: Even Stubberud, leader of a top-secret, counter-terrorism unit.

The retired elite soldier is looking to start a new life in Kenya, where he plans on helping train the Savannah game­ keepers and bring about an end to the ruthless slaughter of elephants and other wildlife. However, strong forces lie behind the poaching activities – forces connected to some of the world’s most powerful nations.

Taus savanne 130 x 205 mm / 304 pages

With an evocative imperial backdrop, The Silent Savannah is an intense and exciting thriller that highlights one of the greatest disasters of our time: Nature’s extinction.

Sigbjørn Mostue (b. 1969) has a degree in the History of Ideas, and has been working as an editor.

He is now a full time writer, having written a number of bestselling books for young readers.

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CRI M E

Sigbjørn Mostue

THE HEAVENS WILL WEEP BLOOD The heavens will weep blood is a one-ofa-kind thriller journey.

Even Stubberud is a soldier in the Special Forces. But now he has fallen sick with cancer. Before he leaves the force he takes on one last mission: A simple escort of a terrorist to Somalia.

The plane from Oslo is hijacked, and the terrorist is set free. The only one who can save the 245 passengers from certain death is an unarmed man, sick with cancer, with no knowledge about planes.

Sigbjørn Mostue has written a fast paced story that also touches our hearts. At times you might have to loose it all to win what is most important.

Himmelen skal gråte blod 130 x 205 mm / 384 pages

Rights sold to: Sweden (Modernista AB)

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CRI M E

Karin Fossum

DEADLY DRAGON, REMORSEFUL DOG We’re in it together, she said. No matter how it ends, we two are in it together – can you promise me that? That she’ll die pretty soon? They looked at each other and smiled. After all, it was only a game.

Aksel is a journalist with the local newspaper whose boss says he's ‘good at tragedies’. His sister Ellinor has lost her job and is desperately seeking to escape from reality. Brother and sister have been close since childhood, bound together by destiny.

A gas leak on a one of the big farms kills several hired hands in their sleep. It looks like an accident.

Drepende drage Angrende hund 130 x 205 mm / 240 pages

In a nearby house, an 80-year-old woman is found lying at the foot of her stairs one day, with a crushed skull.

Somebody has left the place in disarray to make it look like a burglary.

In Deadly Dragon, Remorseful Dog, we meet a new and unusual detective: Eddie Feber – a man blessed with joie de vivre and eight children. Alert and seemingly chaotic, he nonetheless has strategies for bringing the dark truth to light.

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILIABLE '[…] so beautifully written that it's a pleasure'  NETTAVISEN 'MANY CRIME NOVELS LACK THAT SOMETHING ELSE. NOT THIS ONE.'  TØNSBERG BLAD Karin Fossum (b. 1954) made her literary debut in 1974 with the poetry collection Maybe Tomorrow (Kanskje i morgen), for which she won the Vesaas First Writer's Award. She has published books in several genres, but is best known for her crime fiction series about Inspector Konrad Sejer. Several of her books have been filmed for the screen and TV. She has received a number of prestigious awards, including an LA Times Book Award and The Brage Prize for her novel The Indian Bride (Elskede Poona). In 2017 The Riverton Club named her Best Norwegian Crime Writer through the times! Karin Fossum's books are translated into 34 languages.

Rights sold to: Finland (Johnny Kniga), Netherlands (Meulen Hoff)

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CRI M E

Karin Fossum

LOVELY CREATURE Konrad Sejer #15

A single mother finds a disturbing drawing in her son’s room.

A young man and a teenage boy meet by chance on the shores of the deep lake in Svartland Forest.

The next day, sixteen-year-old Gritt Zeeland is found dead in the same forest.

There are so many reasons why a pretty young girl might be in danger.

Police Superintendent Sejer finds himself dealing with a distressing murder mystery that has many possible solutions. Gritt Zeeland let almost nobody get close to her, but there were plenty of people –young and old – who had noticed her.

Lovely Creature is a profoundly penetrating crime novel about beauty and ugliness, tenderness and violence, great lies and painful realities.

'One of Karin Fossum´s very best!

DAGSAVISEN

Bakom synger døden 130 x 205 mm / 384 pages

N E W CRI M E FROM BEST­ SELLER K A RI N FOSSU M

'Masterful! An extremely actual and masterly performed crime novel. Everything is so well done that you feel like immedeatly reading the book again just to see how all the dots are connected.' ✶✶✶✶✶✶ VG

Rights sold to: Denmark (Gyldendal), Netherlands (Meulenhoff), Sweden (Forum), Finland (Johnny Kniga)

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K A RI N FOSSU M 'S BEST­S ELLI NG KON R A D SE J ER NOV ELS

CRI M E / T H RI LLER

Grethe Bøe

MAYDAY

BESTSELLER!

Sensational Action Thriller Debut!

The Arctic is blowing up – and Ylva is the spark!

Caught behind enemy lines, NATOpilots Ylva and John faces a seemingly impossible task: They have to cross the frozen Siberian tundra on foot - with the enemy at their heels – to get back to Norway and stop a catastrophe that might lead to World War III. The relations between Russia and NATO are at a freezing point as NATO launches their greatest ever winter exercise in the far north of Norway. The Russians are provoked and mobilize their own “snap exercise” on the Russian side of the border.

Mayday 130 x 205 mm / 336 pages

A Russian fighter plane is provoking a Norwegian carrier helicopter in the border area between Norway and Russia, and F-16-pilots John Evans and Ylva Nordahl is sent to escort the helicopter safely to shore. The NATO-plane end up in a stress-flight with the Russian plane, and the F-16 is damaged in a near crash, it is then shot down after ending up on the Russian side of the border. The episode sparks political crisis where both Russia and NATO see the event as an attack.

The only thing that can stop an all-destructive conflict is the pilots Ylva Nordahl and John Evans making their way back across the border to Norway, to tell what really happened. It is a fight against time, as the Russian President, The General Secretary of NATO and private military industry are all sharpening their knives.

FULL ENGLISH TRANSLATION AVAILIABLE Grethe Bøe make her debut as an author with the action thriller Mayday. But she has for years been writing and directing internationally prize-winning films and TV-series from the Arctic areas.Her film Operasjon Arktis won the Amanda Prize in 2015 and was also featured at a number of international film festivals. She has worked as a camera assistant with Steven Spielberg.

Rights sold to: Estonia (Ajakirjade Kirjastus), Finland (Bazar), Germany (Heyene Verlag), Italy (Longanesi), Sweden (Modernista). Norway (Nordisk Film), Netherlands (Volt), United Kingdom (Mountain Leoprad Press), Denmark (Lindhardt&Ringhof), Egypt (Al Arabi Publishing & Distribution)

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Foto: Fred Jonny

NORWEGIAN CRIME SENSATION: BRAVO! ‘Grethe Bøe makes a great debut with a chillingly realistic thriller where the north of Norway is in danger of becoming a new Crimea.

DAGBLADET  REFRESHING DEBUT ‘Grethe Bøe and her protagonist Ylva are fresh and welcome additions to the Norwegian Crime Book Universe. It feels refreshing to have the arrival of a female author writing in a genre otherwise dominated by men – already writing with authority and weight about anything from international politics and reindeer herding to how to fly a fighter jet. And not least in a language full of good and creative descriptions and sentences.’

VG A SERIOUSLY FRESH DEBUT The idea and potential is at top level, written with international approach, cockiness and thorough on all the detail; be it the technical parts of flying a fighter jet, military, political or geographical … with main characters that have extreme survival skills and technical knowledge.’

ADRESSEAVISA

CRI M E / T H RI LLER

Hans Olav Lahlum

PURE AS THE DRIVEN SNOW DI Engly Martinsen works against the clock to solve his biggest case yet.

Lawyer and Nazi Party member Jens Otto Helmersen has been found shot dead at his cabin, but the snow around it is untouched. Who is the murderer and how did they manage to commit this crime without leaving so much as a footprint behind them?

In this locked-room mystery from 1942 Oslo, Hans Olav Lahlum interweaves a historical crime mystery with the destinies of a troubled and politically divided family in occupied Norway.

Sneen var ren 130 x 205 mm / 272 pages

Hans Olav Lahlum (b. 1973) is a writer and historian. He made his literary debut with the critically acclaimed biography Oscar Torp in 2007. He has since published a number of crime novels and non-fiction books. His crime novels have become bestsellers in Norway, and are available in English, Greek, Turkish, Bulgarian, Danish, Vietnamese, Portuguese, Russian, Slovakian and Korean.

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CRI M E

BACKLIST:

RIGHTS SOLD TO: SOUTH KOREA, DENMARK, SLOVAKIA, ­BULGARIA, ­V IETNAM, RUSSIA, GREAT BRITAIN, GREECE, P ­ ORTUGAL, TURKEY 57

CRI M E

Terje Bjøranger

THE CALIPHATE A young man is found murdered on Bygdøy island in Oslo. He is dressed in an orange suit and is holding his own head in his hands. Suspicion immediately falls on ISIS. Could there be a link to Islamist extremists or is this a set-up? Charlie Robertson and his police colleagues must work hard and fast to prevent further murders and – not least – to avoid terrorist atrocities the police fear are being planned.

The Caliphate is the third book about Detective Charlie Robertson.

Kalifatet 130 x 205 mm / 416 pages

'VERY GOOD – VERY TERRIFYING'  NETTAVISEN

Terje Bjøranger (b. 1959) lives in Lørenskog and works as a police prosecutor for Kripos. He made his debut in 2012 with The Third Sister. In 2017, he published the critically acclaimed Barcode. Bjøranger has also worked with the Norwegian UDI for several years in areas such as forced marriages and honor crimes.

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PREVIOUS BOOKS:

CRI M E

Ellen Gustavsen Simensen

BELIEVE ME WHEN I LIE Police officer Lars Lukassen sees the chance of a promotion when he is called out to investigate a dead body.

The situation at the police station in Hønefoss deteriorates when a sinister figure starts plaguing schoolchildren. At the same time, teacher Johanna Brekke arrives in town and Lars is attracted to her. But what is Johanna running away from, and who is friend and who is foe in the quest for truth?

Believe Me When I Lie is a psychological crime novel that spans a wide canvas, from eastern Norway to the far west of the country.

Tro meg når jeg lyver 130 x 205 mm / 263 pages

BESTSELLING CRIME DEBUT

ENGLISH SAMPLE TRANSLATION AVAILIABLE ‘The language is playful and colorful, with nature descriptions approaching the poetic and filmatic. Especially when the plot turns to western Norway, she’s good. Very good … This book debut proves to be a solid and suspense-driven thriller, where the author shares her keen insight into the human mind.’

RINGERIKES BLAD

Ellen G. Simensen (b. 1975) is educated works as a career consultant. She has attended Cappelen Damm’s crime author programme, hosts a crime podcast and has arranged several writing courses for young people.

Rights sold to: Sweden (Modernista), France (Editions Gallmeister)

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