Icelandic mystery – The Fox – Sólveig Pálsdóttir

Submitted: 27th September 2020

The Fox set in Iceland

Icelandic mystery – The Fox – Sólveig Pálsdóttir – When I get sent a novel from a newly translated author I get very excited. When they’re are as good as Sólveig Pálsdóttir and when the translator is none other than Quentin Bates, I’m practically dancing around the room.

This short novel features Police Detective Guðgeir Fransson who moves away from the city following several problems in his private and personal life. He hears of a Sri Lankan women who he realises travelled from Reykjavik to Horn, a small coastal town with the promise of a job and accommodation. No one has heard of the beauty salon or place she’s supposed to be living. Now, no one seems to even know what’s happened to her. Police Detective Guðgeir Fransson is keen to find out….

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The Fox set in Iceland? This sounded good from the start and it was. Quite a short novel but it packs a punch. Setting, interesting characters, intrigue, a remote farm, dubious men…this has it all. The Fox takes us to a very interesting town in Iceland – small and coastal at the south of the country, this is as remote as it can get.

So, imagine you’re from Sri Lanka, can speak a little of the language when you are offered a job in a beauty salon. Previously living in shared accommodation and working as a cleaner in Reykjavik Sajee feels this is a new start. Nervous she gets on the plane and oh my god that turbulence! (you might want to skip this bit if you’re due to fly). When she lands at the small, icy airport, there’s no one to meet her. I really felt for her at this point as you just know things are going to get worse.

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Much of the story is told by Sajee but the other thread is taken up by Guðgeir and Sajee. You really want him to find her as you know what she is going through. I wanted to ring him up and tell him where she was, I was that involved in her fate. Sajee was an endearing character who brought with her tales and superstitions of her homeland. She has a buddha which she places in her dirty room and it’s the little details like that which really make her distress and situation all the more human.

It’s not a spoiler to say that a lot of this story takes place at a remote farm, at the foot of the mountains, at the far side of a lagoon…sounds nice but there’s never anyone around… The setting here was very powerfully evoked. Vividly chilling!

If you do go to Iceland and get lost however, you’d want someone like Guðgeir to look for you. He’s not giving up any time soon! I wonder if we will find out more about his past in future books as I bet that is full of things which could fill several books. I found his search for her extremely compelling to follow and his compassion a light in a dark novel.

The title becomes very meaningful at the end and it left me thinking about this for ages afterwards. This is a small novel with a big bite. Like the fox in the title, it lingers, traps the reader, stops still for a moment and leaves you waiting to see what it will do next.

Incidentally, that cover is one of the best I’ve seen in a long time!