Berge

By Jan Kjaerstad

2017

First Published

3.77

Average Rating

379

Number of Pages

11H34M

Audio Length

One August day in 2008 the Norwegian Labour Party's most colourful MP, Arve Storefjeld, is discovered in a remote cabin in the country, together with four of his family and friends, all with their throats slit. This unprecedented crime in the peaceful backwater of Norway sends shudders through the national psyche, as the search for the perpetrators begins and people have to adjust to the terrifying thought: it can happen here too. The rapidly unfolding events are narrated from the standpoints of three observers who in different ways become drawn in to the investigation: Ine Wang, a young journalist who has just finished a biography of Storefjeld and realises that the tragedy has presented her with an irresistible scoop; Peter Malm, a judge whose ideal of a quiet contemplative life away from public scrutiny is turned upside-down by his unwilling involvement in the case; and Nicolai Berge, a former boyfriend of one of the victims, who emerges as the main suspect and a focus for the public demand for catharsis. Published six years after the trauma of 22 July 2011, when 77 Norwegians were killed in a one-man assault on the government offices in Oslo and a Young Labour camp on the island of Utoya, Jan Kjærstad's novel explores the vulnerabilities of modern life and the terrifying unpredictability of acts of terror.

Avg Rating

3.77

Number of Ratings

705

5 STARS

21%

4 STARS

46%

3 STARS

24%

2 STARS

1 STARS

goodreads

Author

Jan Kjaerstad

Author · 13 books

Jan Kjærstad is a Norwegian author. Kjærstad is a theology graduate from MF Norwegian School of Theology and the University of Oslo. He has written a string of novels, short stories and essays and was editor of the literary magazine Vinduet ("The Window"). He has received a number of prizes, the most important being the Nordic Council Literature Prize, which he received for the perspectivist trilogy about the TV personality Jonas Wergeland (The Seducer, The Conqueror and The Discoverer). Kjærstad's books are complex and humorous, showing an outstanding ability to visualize modern life and its many interdependencies, reminiscent of a less computer-focused Neal Stephenson. His books have been translated to English, French, German, Danish, Swedish, and Hungarian, among others.