White As Snow (An Áróra Investigation Book Three) by Lilja Sigurđardóttir

 

White as Snow (An Áróra Investigation Book Three) by Lilja Sigurđardóttir.

Translated by Quentin Bates.

Published 12th October 2023 by Orenda Books.

From the cover of the book:

On a snowy winter morning, an abandoned shipping container is discovered near Reykjavík. Inside are the bodies of five young women – one of them barely alive.

As Icelandic Police detective Daníel struggles to investigate the most brutal crime of his career, Áróra looks into the background of a suspicious man, who turns out to be engaged to Daníel's former wife, and the connections don’t stop there…

Daníel and Áróra’s cases pit them both against ruthless criminals with horrifying agendas, while Áróra persists with her search for her missing sister, Ísafold, whose devastating disappearance continues to haunt her.

As the temperature drops and the 24-hour darkness and freezing snow hamper their efforts, their investigations become increasingly dangerous … for everyone.

Atmospheric, twisty and breathtakingly tense, White as Snow is the third instalment in the riveting, award-winning An Áróra Investigation series, as crimes committed far beyond Iceland’s shores come home…

Shortlisted for The Blood Drop – Icelandic Crime Novel of the Year, 2022

***********

In the midst of an Icelandic winter, an abandoned shipping container is found in Reykjavík that holds a grim discovery. Inside are the bodies of five young women, who appear to have been left to die in the freezing temperatures. Miraculously, one of them is still alive, and police detective Daníel Hansson desperately hopes she will be the key to explaining the mystery behind this shocking crime scene - if she survives.

As Daníel and his team struggle to make headway in their investigation, Áróra is distracted from her continuing search for her missing sister by a request from Daníel to help his ex-wife Elín delve into the murky past of the much younger Russian man she hopes to marry.

While the snow falls, Daníel and Áróra find themselves embroiled in the world of organised crime, where black hearts care nothing for the vulnerable lives they exploit in pursuit of their own ends, and as the threads of their separate investigations cross-over, danger looms...

White as Snow is the third cracking instalment of the Áróra Investigations series. It can be read as standalone, but is so much better if you have read the previous books, Cold As Hell and Red as Blood, as the backstories of Daníel and Áróra add an extra dimension.

The search for a gang of unscrupulous villains engaged in the very worst kind of people trafficking lies at the heart of the chilling tale, which Sigurđardóttir gives real power to by shining a light on the desperation of the victims who become trapped by them. The case hits Daníel hard, and he feels the pressure of searching for elusive clues while keeping his precious witness safe from those who mean her harm. In parallel, Áróra is persuaded by Daníel to pry into the domestic affairs of his ex-wife, who is trapped in a toxic relationship that brings to the surface uncomfortable memories for Áróra in more ways than one.

The threads of the story weave beautifully together with atmospheric menace, flipping between the disturbing logistics of the people trafficking operation, the teamwork of Daníel and his team, and Áróra's sleuthing, bringing in fascinating elements of police procedural on a local and international scale, and gritty detective noir set against a deliciously described wintry backdrop. The crime story draws you in, with juicy reveals that tie Daníel and Áróra's seemingly unconnected plotlines together, building suspense and keeping you turning the pages as all the little pieces fall into place.

This book impresses with so much more than a well-conceived crime mystery, because around the gritty thrills and spills Sigurđardóttir embroiders details that pick out so much about the complicated feelings that make up the human condition and how they colour the judgement of the characters. She delves into the search for identity; the yearning of those who long for love and human connection; the joy and heartache of family (both blood and found); and the complex emotional baggage that comes with past and present romantic relationships... not to mention, the way she packs a real punch in following the heartrending tales of the victims of human traffickers. This is a crime story with layers, and Quentin Bates does an excellent job ensuring his translation gives them all their moment to shine.

This is another chilling winner from Sigurđardóttir, in a series that just gets better and better. More please!

White as Snow is available to buy now in paperback, ebook and audio formats. You can support indie publishing by buying direct from Orenda Books HERE.

Thank you to Orenda Books for sending me a proof of this book in return for an honest review, and to Random Things Tours for inviting me to be a part of this blog tour.

About the author: 

Icelandic crime-writer Lilja Sigurdardóttir was born in the town of Akranesin 1972 and raised in Mexico, Sweden, Spain and Iceland. 

An award-winning playwright, Lilja has written four crime novels, with Snare, the first in a new series and Lilja's English debut shortlisting for the CWA International Dagger and hitting bestseller lists worldwide. Trap soon followed suit, with the third in the trilogy Cage winning the Best Icelandic Crime Novel of the Year, and was a Guardian Book of the Year. 

Lilja's standalone Betrayal, was shortlisted for the Glass Key Award for Best Nordic Crime Novel. 

In 2021, Cold as Hell, the first in the An Áróra Investigation series was published, with Red as Blood to follow in 2022. The film rights have been bought by Palomar Pictures in California. 

Lilja is also an award-winning screenwriter in her native Iceland. She lives in Reykjavík with her partner.

About the translator:

Quentin Bates escaped English suburbia as a teenager, jumping at the chance of a gap year working in Iceland. For a variety of reasons, the gap year stretched to become a gap decade, during which time he went native in the north of Iceland, acquiring a new language a new profession as a seaman and a family, before decamping en masse for England. 

He worked as a truck driver, teacher, netmaker and trawlerman at various times before falling into journalism, largely by accident. 

He is the author of a series of crime novels set in present-day Iceland (Frozen Out, Cold Steal, Chilled to the Bone, Winterlude, Cold Comfort and Thin Ice which have been published worldwide. 

He has translated all of Ragnar Jónasson’s Dark Iceland series.