Last Rituals: An Icelandic Novel of Secret Symbols, Medieval Witchcraft, and Modern Murder

published	October 1st 2007 by William Morrow
binding	Hardcover
isbn	0061143367 (isbn13: 9780061143366)
pages	256
description	The spellbinding debut and international sensation being published in thirty countries featuring Thóra Gudmundsdóttir, a smart, sexy lawyer and investigator whose hunt for a modern murderer points to a very odd — and evil — chapter in Iceland's past. ...more [close] The spellbinding debut and international sensation being published in thirty countries featuring Thóra Gudmundsdóttir, a smart, sexy lawyer and investigator whose hunt for a modern murderer points to a very odd — and evil — chapter in Iceland's past. After the body of a young German student — with his eyes cut out and strange symbols carved into his chest — is discovered at a university in Reykjavík, the police waste no time in making an arrest. The victim's family isn't convinced they have the right man, however, so they ask Thóra Gudmundsdóttir, attorney and single mother of two, to investigate. The fee is considerable — more than enough to make things a bit easier for the struggling lawyer and her children. It's not long before Thóra and Matthew Reich, her new associate, discover something unusual about the deceased student: He had been obsessed with the country's grisly history of torture, execution, and witch hunts — a topic made all the more peculiar by the fact that unlike witch hunts in other countries, those in Iceland had targeted men . . . not women. As Thóra and Matthew dig deeper, they make the connection between long-bygone customs and the student's murder. But the shadow of dark traditions conceals secrets in both the past and the present, and the investigators soon realize that nothing is as it seems . . . and that no one can be trusted. [close]
date added	07-31-07 edit book

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Larissa rated it:

11/25/07

bookshelves: crime-fiction, scandinavian

Read in November, 2007

For a novel about witchcraft and ancient pagan rituals and such, this book was strangely prudish. On many levels, actually. For one, several of the book's main characters--a group of part-time witchcraft enthusiasts/alterna-college students (they have piercings! and tattoos! and they do drugs! and still get A's!)--are embarassingly endowed with the language of 12 year olds in 90s middle America, scoffing at the world with such badass rejoinders as "Don't be a jerk," and 'As if!" T...more For a novel about witchcraft and ancient pagan rituals and such, this book was strangely prudish. On many levels, actually. For one, several of the book's main characters--a group of part-time witchcraft enthusiasts/alterna-college students (they have piercings! and tattoos! and they do drugs! and still get A's!)--are embarassingly endowed with the language of 12 year olds in 90s middle America, scoffing at the world with such badass rejoinders as "Don't be a jerk," and 'As if!" They are 2D caricatures, exaggerated Bad Seeds that smack of an outsider's attempt to capture a subculture she has no understanding of. This is unfortunate, as in some ways, the struggle to understand and accept societal outliers into the still relatively homogeneous and insulated Icelandic character could be a matter of real self-reflection and (plot-strengthening) importance in a book like this.

I do believe that Sigurdardottir knows this implicitly--her single working mom cum co-detective Thora Gudmundsdottir awkwardly navigates such unheard of territories as erotic asphyxiation and body modification, and tries in vain for most of the novel to figure out what could be ailing her teenage son--only to find out that he's fathered a child with his fifteen-year-old girlfriend. The idea is that she's navigating a new world, with new problems that she's not necessarily equipped for. And this could be great copy, except for the fact that on top of a complete lack of understanding of any of the 'perversions' that she comes across, each moment of potential pathos is completely muted and rushed over. Mom storms out of a meeting with her son's baby-momma and folks just to go home and make dinner with her new boyfriend--albeit a wacky dinner because she's all out of sorts--and consoles the kid with the idea that he can come up with names for the baby (abortion, I might add, is not even an option that is mentioned as having been definitively excluded...) before rushing off for a business meeting with her clients.

It's not to say that there's no good here. The historical aspects (Thora has to become familiar with ancient European witch-hunting rituals and texts, leading her all over Iceland to peruse Withcraft museums in the middle of nowhere) are relatively untrodden and fascinating in a gruesome sort of way; the consciously multi-lingual element (we are told that characters speak Icelandic, English, and German throughout) gives the plot a sort of globe-trotting, urbane feel; and the heroine is potentially the type of plucky, ill-equipped, firecracker that a reader likes to get behind.

So, final verdict is, I think: 'A' for effort, but severely limited....less

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Last Rituals: An Icelandic Novel of Secret Symbols, Medieval Witchcraft, and Modern Murder

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