Tag: crime

#BookReview The Assistant by Kjell Ola Dahl @OrendaBooks @RandomTTours

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Welcome to today’s stop on the blog tour for The Assistant by Kjell Ola Dahl, translated by Don Bartlett. My thanks to Anne at Random Things Tours for inviting me to participate in the tour and to Orenda Books for my digital review copy.

The AssistantAbout the Book

Oslo, 1938. War is in the air and Europe is in turmoil. Hitler’s Germany has occupied Austria and is threatening Czechoslovakia; there’s a civil war in Spain and Mussolini reigns in Italy.

When a woman turns up at the office of police-turned-private investigator Ludvig Paaske, he and his assistant – his one-time nemesis and former drug-smuggler Jack Rivers – begin a seemingly straightforward investigation into marital infidelity.

But all is not what it seems, and when Jack is accused of murder, the trail leads back to the 1920s, to prohibition-era Norway, to the smugglers, sex workers and hoodlums of his criminal past … and an extraordinary secret.

Format: Paperback (276 pages)   Publisher: Orenda
Publication date: 13th May 2021 Genre: Historical Fiction, Crime, Thriller, Mystery

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My Review

The Assistant switches back and forth between two timelines, one set in 1924/25 (when Oslo was still known as Kristiania) and the other in 1938. The leading characters, Ludvig Paaske and Jack Rivers, appear in both timelines, as do other individuals but only gradually does it become clear how they and the events described interact. At one point, on returning to a house he visited fourteen years earlier, Jack observes how ‘time can go round in circles’ and I had much the same feeling. Thankfully, the chapter headings clearly identify which of the two timelines the reader is in.

The dictionary defines an assistant as ‘person who assists or gives aid and support; helper, a person who is subordinate to another in rank, function, etc.; one holding a secondary rank in an office or post’. I liked how the author plays with the concept of being an assistant.

When we initially meet Jack Rivers he is working for Arvid Bjerke, the owner of a transport company, driving vehicles carrying goods, including contraband alcohol, to Bjerke’s customers. In other words, Jack is assisting in criminal activity. Moving forward fourteen years, Jack is working as assistant to Ludvig Paaske, a former police office who now runs a private investigation business. Ludvig has hired Jack despite his criminal record so you could say Paaske is assisting Jack to go straight.

If only the relationship between the two men was as straightforward as that. For example, does the role of assistant imply a degree of loyalty to the person you are assisting? From Paaske’s point of view it seems clear it does. ‘An assistant means outgoings, but he has to be able to repay investment, to add value.’  But if this is the case, should there be an expectation of the same in return?

Ludwig and Jack are both flawed characters who have done bad things and made poor decisions in the past (although many of the female characters are not much better).  But which of them has damaged their integrity the most as a result?  Can the reader forgive either of them for their past actions?

At one point in the earlier timeline, Jack gets the sense he is being manipulated by unknown individuals, that someone is standing above him pulling the strings.  There’s something in that as he seems to have the uncanny habit of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, sometimes even at the site of a murder.

With a storyline containing so many twists and turns it’s occasionally easy to feel lost so I welcomed Jack sharing his theories in such a cogent manner in the final chapter. Setting out of the moves made by the various characters and their motivations for doing so in the way he does neatly references his own love of solving chess problems. And his piecing together of the disparate parts of the metaphorical jigsaw to reveal the full picture brings to mind Paaske undertaking the same task with the handmade jigsaws sent to him by his artist daughter.

One of the reasons I enjoy historical fiction so much is that I invariably learn things I would have never otherwise known about. For example, I wasn’t aware that Norway had a period of prohibition in the interwar years or that the Norwegian government opposed its citizens joining those fighting the fascists in the Spanish Civil War. Along with the historical detail, the book conjures up a vivid picture of Norwegian lifestyle which is clearly much influenced by its landscape – the lakeside summer houses, swimming and sailing, travelling on the ferries that ply between Oslo and the small islands that surround it.

I believe the mark of a skilful translation is if at no time you feel you are reading a book translated from another language; such was the case here. The book moves along at pace, rather in the manner of the oncoming train in the opening scene. With its intricate plot, The Assistant will keep you guessing until you turn the final page and quite possibly pondering on what you’ve read for some time after that.

In three words: Complex, suspenseful, accomplished

Try something similar: The Night of Shooting Stars by Ben Pastor

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DahlKjellOlaAbout the Author

One of the fathers of the Nordic Noir genre, Kjell Ola Dahl was born in 1958 in Gjøvik. He made his debut in 1993, and has since published eighteen novels, the most prominent of which form a series of police procedurals-cum-psychological thrillers featuring investigators Gunnarstranda and Frølich. In 2000 he won the Riverton Prize for The Last Fix, and he won both the prestigious Brage and Riverton Prizes for The Courier in 2015 (published in English by Orenda Books in 2019). His work has been published in fourteen countries. He lives in Oslo.

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About the Translator

Don Bartlett completed an MA in Literary Translation at the University of East Anglia in 2000 and has since worked with a wide variety of Danish and Norwegian authors, including Jo Nesbø and Karl Ove Knausgård. For Orenda he has translated several titles in Gunnar Staalesen’s Varg Veum series: We Shall Inherit the Wind, Wolves in the Dark, the Petrona award-winning Where Roses Never Die and Fallen Angels. He has also translated three books in Kjell Ola Dahl’s Oslo Detectives series for Orenda – Faithless, The Ice Swimmer and Sister – as well as The Courier.

The Assistant BT Poster

#BookReview Don’t Turn Around by Jessica Barry @VintageBooks

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Don't Turn AroundAbout the Book

Two strangers, Cait and Rebecca, are driving across America.

Cait’s job is to transport women to safety. Out of respect, she never asks any questions. Like most of the women, Rebecca is trying to escape something.

But what if Rebecca’s secrets put them both in danger? There’s a reason Cait chooses to keep on the road, helping strangers. She has a past of her own, and knows what it’s like to be followed.

And there is someone right behind them, watching their every move…

Format: Paperback (320 pages)     Publisher: Vintage
Publication date: 15th April 2021 Genre: Thriller, Crime, Mystery

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My Review

I don’t read thrillers all that often but when I do it’s because I’m looking for a palate cleanser from my usual diet of historical fiction and I’m pleased to say Don’t Turn Around fitted the bill perfectly. If you’ve been following the blog tour, you’ll have seen book bloggers sharing extracts from the book along with their reviews. Even if you haven’t, there’s still time to check out their posts (see poster below).

The author deploys all the weapons of the thriller writer – short chapters, compelling final sentences, multiple timelines and narrators, as well as red herrings galore. I developed several theories about what was going on and who was behind it, all of which ended up being dumped in the literary equivalent of a roadside garbage bin.

However, the plot also incorporates more serious topics such as women’s rights and the impact of social media. In the case of the latter, it’s bang up-to-date with its references to anonymous site 4chan. Misogyny and violence against women is a key issue addressed. As Rebecca observes, “Wasn’t living under the constant threat of danger just a part of being a woman in this world?” In fact, my one reservation about the book was whether its cast of unlikable male characters and the way events play out doesn’t in fact reinforce this notion.

I liked the way the author explored the dynamics of the relationship between the two women. Although only ten years apart in age, they start off believing they have little in common. Cait’s journalistic ambitions have come to nothing, seeing her working as a bartender and relying on tips to meet her rent bill. Whereas, from Cait’s point of view, Rebecca is someone whose privileged life has been ‘one long red carpet rolling out in front of her, ready to be stepped on’. Of course, first impressions can be deceptive.

Gradually, the barriers between the two women start to break down to the extent that Cait even wonders if she and Rebecca might have been friends in other circumstances. However, she quickly dismisses the idea, reminding herself that she’s there to do a job and nothing else. As it turns out, they’ll need to rely on each other’s ingenuity and courage more than they could ever have imagined.

The book paints an interesting picture of small town America with its roadside restaurants, motels and bars. The chapter headings listing the places the two women travel through (the majority of which I suspect few people have ever heard) acquire a sort of poetic quality: Clovis, Melrose, Yeso, Vaughn, Pastura, Taiban, Tolar. The enumeration of the miles left to travel to their destination acts like a countdown clock, increasing the tension but also giving the story a real-time feel. In another clever touch, as the story switches between their journey and recent events in the lives of the two women, the intervals reduce from months, to weeks, and finally to days until the timelines finally converge.

The two women have several tense and bruising encounters as they drive through Texas and New Mexico, a landscape described as ‘nothing but scrubland and the long flat ribbon of road and the vast black sky’. Oh, and there’s no phone signal either.

Don’t Turn Around is the kind of book I categorize as a trains, planes and automobiles read by which I mean it would be the ideal choice to pass the time on a long journey – although perhaps not if travelling as a passenger in a car on a lonely road! The book is clearly the work of a skilled writer who knows how to grab the attention of the reader – well, this one at least – and ensure it never wanders until the final page is turned.

My thanks to Graeme Williams for letting me know about the book and for organising my review copy.

In three words: Compelling, intense, suspenseful

Try something similar: Duel by Richard Matheson (or the 1971 TV film version starring Dennis Weaver and directed by one Steven Spielberg)

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Jess BarryAbout the Author

Jessica Barry is a pseudonym for an American author who grew up in a small town in Massachusetts and was raised on a steady diet of library books and PBS. She attended Boston University, where she majored in English and Art History, before moving to London in 2004 to pursue an MA from University College London. She lives with her husband, Simon, and their two cats, Roger Livesey and BoJack Horseman. (Photo credit: Twitter profile)

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