#BlogTour- Stella Blómkvist- Murder Under The Midnight Sun (tr. Quentin Bates) – @StellaBlomkv @graskeggur @CorylusB

Smart, ruthless and with a flexible moral code all of her own, razor-tongued lawyer Stella Blómkvist is also dealing with a desperate deathbed request to track down a young woman who vanished a decade ago. It looks like a dead end, but she agrees to pick up the stone-cold trail – and she never gives up, even if the police did a long time ago. Then there’s the mystery behind the arm that emerges from an ice cap, with a mysterious ruby ring on one frozen finger? How does this connect to another unexplained disappearance, and why were the police at the time so keen to write it off as a tragic accident? Brutal present-day crimes have their roots in the past that some people would prefer to stay forgotten. As Stella pieces together the fragments, is she getting too close to the truth and making herself a target for ruthless men determined to conceal secret sins?

Ooh I do love a character with more than a bit of sass, and the eponymous Stella Blómkvist has it in spades. As it says on the jacket blurb, the tough, razor-tongued Blómkvist has a taste for neat whiskey, a liking for easy money, and a wonderful joie de vivre. You’d have to be the dimmest of the dim-witted not to want to have this unconventional lawyer on your side. She is a force of nature, and Murder Under The Midnight Sun does nothing to disabuse us of this striking impression of her. This is second of the Stella Blómkvist series following  Murder At The Residence, with absolute go-to Icelandic translator Quentin Bates, who always delivers a lively and entertaining translation. The author’s identity is shrouded in secrecy, despite producing not only these brilliant books, but also as the inspiration for the hugely successful TV adaptation.

As I’ve said I do like my female protagonists to have more than a dash of hellcat, kick-assed-ness about them and the character of Stella Blómkvist is a shining example of this. She is strident, obstinate and wilful, with an incredibly fluid sexuality, and instead of watching life passing by, is always front and centre of whatever she has got herself entangled in. I think we should all endeavour to #BeMoreStella to be honest. With the influence of the homespun wisdom of her late mother, permeating her actions and perceptions, for example,

“There are some people who can’t find their own arses with both hands, as Mother said”

Stella inveigles herself, either by accident or design, into a host of tricky situations, with her gung-ho, can-do attitude, but never losing sight of standing up for those she believes to be side-lined or misrepresented. She is a wonderful character, and Blómkvist, the author, has conjured up someone rather special.

This book sees her involved in not only a tricky murder case, with a tangled web of personal relationships, and poisonous secrets, but in the tradition of this genre, delves deep into the murky political and social machinations of Iceland’s past. I’m a great believer that reading opens up your eyes to the life and culture of countries, that you know little about, and may never have the chance to experience, so I greatly enjoyed the backstory of double crossing and betrayal that permeates the narrative. As Stella and her associates begin to unravel this complicated history, the author ratchets up the tension, whilst carefully keeping in the light relief of Blómkvist’s sexual entanglements, and her fearless, taking no prisoners attitude.

These books are compact but pack in so much, ultimately delivering a mighty punch and Murder Under The Midnight Sun is no exception. Full of drama, humour and bolstered by some interesting social history, with a cracking translation, there is much to be enjoyed here. Enjoy it I most surely did, and fun was had. Recommended.

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After 25 years and 13 books- now available in English for the first time- the identity of Icelandic crime star Stella Blómkvist remains a secret. This has been a bestselling series in Iceland since the first of these tales appeared in the 1990s, and has attracted an international audience since the TV series starring Heiða Reed aired. The series features tough, razor-tongued, Reykjavík lawyer Stella Blómkvist, with her taste for neat whiskey, a liking for easy money and a moral compass all of her own – and who is at home in the corridors of power as in the city’s darkest nightspots.

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 and a family. He is the author of a series of crime novels set in present-day Iceland – and as a translator he has worked with some of Iceland’s coolest writers, including Lilja Sigurðardóttir, Sólveig Pálsdóttir, Stella Blómkvist, Einar Kárason, Ragnar Jónasson, Jónína Leósdóttir, Óskar Guðmundsson and more.

(With thanks to Corylus Books for the ARC)

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