The Darkness, Ragnar Jonasson
The Darkness, Ragnar Jonasson
List: $19.99 | Sale: $13.99
Club: $9.99

The Darkness
A Thriller

Author: Ragnar Jónasson

Narrator: Amanda Redman

Unabridged: 5 hr 22 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/16/2018

Synopsis

"Narrator Amanda Redman gives an adept performance as she takes on the various characters in this Icelandic thriller." — AudioFile Magazine

Spanning the icy streets of Reykjavik, the Icelandic highlands and cold, isolated fjords, The Darkness is an atmospheric thriller from Ragnar Jónasson, one of the most exciting names in Nordic Noir.

The body of a young Russian woman washes up on an Icelandic shore. After a cursory investigation, the death is declared a suicide and the case is quietly closed.

Over a year later Detective Inspector Hulda Hermannsdóttir of the Reykjavík police is forced into early retirement at 64. She dreads the loneliness, and the memories of her dark past that threaten to come back to haunt her. But before she leaves she is given two weeks to solve a single cold case of her choice. She knows which one: the Russian woman whose hope for asylum ended on the dark, cold shore of an unfamiliar country. Soon Hulda discovers that another young woman vanished at the same time, and that no one is telling her the whole story. Even her colleagues in the police seem determined to put the brakes on her investigation. Meanwhile the clock is ticking.

Hulda will find the killer, even if it means putting her own life in danger.

About Ragnar Jónasson

RAGNAR JÓNASSON is an international number one award-winning and bestselling author who has sold over four million books in thirty-six territories worldwide. He is the only Icelandic author to have entered the Wall Street Journal bestseller list. Jónasson was born in Reykjavik, where he also teaches copyright law at Reyk­javík University. He has previously worked on radio and television, including as a TV news reporter, and, since the age of seventeen, has translated fourteen of Agatha Christie’s novels into Icelandic. He is the co-founder of the Reykjavík internation­al crime writing festival Iceland Noir. His critically ac­claimed international bestseller The Darkness is soon to be a major CBS Studios TV series, starring Lena Olin as Hulda, directed by Lasse Hallstrom. Ragnar's novel, Outside, is in development as a feature film by Ridley Scott's production company.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Miriam on October 21, 2018

"The Darkness" by Ragnar Jonasson is the first in the 'Hidden Iceland' series which sadly I found quite flat and with a rather bland and whingeing female protagonist, Hulda Hermannsdóttir. Considering the author is an already an established best selling writer of the excellent "Dark Iceland" series......more

Goodreads review by Louise on March 14, 2018

At the age of sixty-four, Detective inspector Hulda Hermannsdottir of the Reykjavik Police is about to take on her last case before she retires. A young woman, an asylum seeker from Russia, found murdered on the seaweed rocks of the Vatnsleysustrand in Iceland. When Hulda starts to ask questions, it......more

Goodreads review by Rachel on March 10, 2020

3.5 stars I listened to this book as it was the Mystery Book Club choice at my library. I’m glad I read it, since I never would have picked it up on my own, but also I have some conflicted feelings on this book as a whole. I loved Hulda as a character, and she’s what drives the novel for sure. I wa......more

Quotes

Praise for The Darkness:
"The Darkness is a bullet train of a novel, at once blazingly contemporary and Agatha-Christie old-fashioned. With prose as pure and crisp as Reykjavik snowcrust, Ragnar Jónasson navigates the treacherous narrative with a veteran’s hand. I reached the end with adrenalized anticipation, the final twist hitting me in the face. I dare you not to be shocked." —Gregg Hurwitz, New York Times bestselling author


Praise for Snowblind (The Dark Iceland series)

"A classic crime story . . .first-rate and highly recommended." —Lee Child

“A modern Icelandic take on an Agatha Christie-style mystery, as twisty as any slalom...” —Ian Rankin

"Jonasson skillfully alternates points of view and shifts of time...The action builds to a shattering climax."--Publishers Weekly (boxed and starred)

"classically crafted whodunit" ... "Jonasson’s true gift is for describing the daunting beauty of the fierce setting, lashed by blinding snowstorms that smother the village in “a thick, white darkness” that is strangely comforting." —The New York Times

"... a chiller of a thriller ... It’s good enough to share shelf space with the works of Yrsa Sigurdardottir and Arnaldur Indridason, Iceland’s crime novel royalty." —The Washington Post

"the best sort of gloomy storytelling" —Chicago Tribune

“If a Golden Age crime novel was to emerge from a literary deep freeze then you’d hope it would read like this.” —Craig Robertson

“Seductive … an old-fashioned murder mystery with a strong central character and the fascinating background of a small Icelandic town cut off by snow. Ragnar does claustrophobia beautifully.” —Ann Cleeves

"Required reading"—New York Post

"Snowblind is morally more equivocal than most traditional whodunnits, and it offers alluring glimpses of darker, and infinitely more threatening horizons." —The Independent (UK)

Add to Cart
Add to Wish List