Top Ten Tuesday: Books I Would Recommend to Readers Who Normally Don't Read Scandinavian Authors!

Wow that's a long title! So this week the topic is as stated in the title - books I would recommend to readers who don't normally read books by Scandinavian authors. Head over to The Broke and the Bookish to see what other bloggers have come up with - here we go:

10) "The Dinosaur Feather" by Sissel-Jo Gazan
A young mother and student at University of Copenhagen is writing her thesis on dinosaurs when she becomes embroiled in a mystery. A professor has died under strange circumstances and now everyone at the faculty are under suspicion.

9) "Otto is a Rhino" by Ole Lund Kirkegaard
One of the cutest children's book ever about a boy who draws a rhino that then comes to life. A classic.

8) "Ronia, The Robber's Daughter" by Astrid Lindgren
Lindgren is the original mother of girlpower. You probably know her famous "daughter" Pippe Longstocking who is so strong that she can lift a horse? Ronia is made of the same stuff and runs away from home to live in the forest, such a cool girl!

7) "The Exception" by Christian Jungersen
A nerve-rackingly mystery thriller about adult bullying. Very difficult to summarize but very easy to read in one go out of pure excitement.

6) "The Boys from St. Petri" by Bjarne Reuter
This is dark YA at its best! A group of young men take a stance during WWII and decide to fight the Germans by sabotaging the German war effort. Gripping. A classic history YA read and a must-read in most Danish schools.

5) "Popular Music from Vittula" by Mikael Niemi
This Sweden is so incredibly different from the Sweden that Stieg Larsson describes. This is a Sweden of folk tales, of magic, of saunas and drinking competitions, of midsummer nights and becoming a man. Give it a try, you won't regret it.

4) "The Half Brother" by Lars Saabye Christensen
I read this one right when it came out about ten years ago and really enjoyed it. It is about half brothers growing up in Oslo in the 1960's. It really touched me, I remember.

3) "Doghead" by Morten Ramsland
This one I haven't actually read myself but it was recommended so many times that I am going to include it anyway :-)

2) "Exile" by Jakob Ejersbo
This author died way to young. His writings have so much promise and the Tanzania trilogy of which "Exile" is the first have become huge successes in his native Denmark.

1) "Seven Gothic Tales" by Karen Blixen
A classic, a must read from one of the greatest Scandinavian authors ever.

So which books are you recommending this week?

Review: "Mercy"

Rarely do I review a book that I didn't enjoy which is mostly because I tend to not finish books that I don't enjoy. Call it lazy, call it silly and ignorant - I can't help it. If I don't enjoy a book, I find it intolerable having to force myself to read it. Not an option. There are exceptions though and this is one of them. "Mercy" by Jussi Adler-Olsen is the first books in a series and I for some unapparent reason started with number four, then number three, then number two and then the first. Strange way of doing it which I don't particularly recommend. Anyway back to topic. I had enjoyed the other three, especially the second one and I thought that I would give this one a go.

The context of the story is one that you have heard many times before... the main character is a policeman who is very very good at his work but who has trouble working with others. His boss is somewhat understanding of this and lets him go and do more or less his own thing on his own. In this case, said policeman, Carl Morck is not entirely on his own, with him he has his cleaner, Assad, who happens to have real talent for policework. Coincidence.
Together these two strange characters get involved with a case of a young, successful, female politician who went missing years ago. And meanwhile the point-of-view shifts from Carl to this young woman, who has been captured and imprisoned in strange room with no windows, no contact to the outside world, while her captors demand that she explain why she did what she did - while she keeps asking why she is there.

So far, so good. This is a pretty run-of-mill crime fiction piece if you ask me. It really didn't impress me. Too predictable and too unimaginative but let me be more specific:

Five things I liked about "Mercy":
1) The dry humour of Carl Morck is pretty great, saves the book actually.
2) The Assad character is quite loveable.
3) The imprisonment part is imaginative and different if really disgusting.
4) Carl Morck's stepson figures a bit in this book and more in the next ones and I have to admit that these descriptions of the sullenness and mood swings of a teenage boy are pretty spot on and funny.
5) ... can't think if one....


Five things I disliked about "Mercy":
1) The title. The original title translates "The Woman in the Cage" which you have to admit is about a 100 times more interesting than "Mercy".
2) The character of the female politician is beyond predictable. She is pretty, she is compassionate, she has nice suitors whom she rejects to dedicate her life to worthier things, she has all the right opinions.... Honestly, it is just too much.
3) The villains are never really explored or explained. In some of Adler-Olsen's later works, he does a much better job of exploring the motives, making it much more interesting to read.
4) The predictability of Carl Morck, the essential renegade policeman. Why are there no crime fiction books about policeman who do things by the book and succeed? It seems like they all have to be rebellious and anti-social, I would like a bit of change please.
5) The political remarks here and there. They are so misplaced and have nothing to do with the story. They end up being really annoying side-remarks that break up the story and promotes the author's political opinions without adding to the story.

So there you go. If you like Scandinavian crime fiction maybe this one is for you. My advice would be to let this one go and head straight for the next book in the series.

The Scandinavian Reading Challenge

I have now taken on my first challenge here in the blogosphere and I'm really excited about it! My first challenge will be The Scandinavian Reading Challenge hosted by The Black Sheep Dances http://www.theblacksheepdances.com - a really great blog about books.
The Scandinavian Reading Challenge is to read 6 books by Scandinavian authors by December 31, 2010. Should be possible. So here I go. My current ideas for Scandinavian readings are:

- Jo Nesbo: The Devil's Star (which I am currently reading)
- Christian Jungersen: The Exception
- Karen Blixen: Winter's Tales
- John Ajvide Lindkvist: Let the Right One In
- Astrid Lindgren: Pippi Longstocking
- Peter Hoegh: Miss Smilla's Feeling for Snow
- Hallgrimur Helgason: 101 Reykjavik

Knowing myself, I will probably deviate from the list though... I'm really not very good at sticking to lists but let's see how it goes!