KotiRyhmätKeskusteluLisääAjan henki
Etsi sivustolta
Tämä sivusto käyttää evästeitä palvelujen toimittamiseen, toiminnan parantamiseen, analytiikkaan ja (jos et ole kirjautunut sisään) mainostamiseen. Käyttämällä LibraryThingiä ilmaiset, että olet lukenut ja ymmärtänyt käyttöehdot ja yksityisyydensuojakäytännöt. Sivujen ja palveluiden käytön tulee olla näiden ehtojen ja käytäntöjen mukaista.

Tulokset Google Booksista

Pikkukuvaa napsauttamalla pääset Google Booksiin.

Ladataan...

The Day is Dark (2008)

Tekijä: Yrsa Sigurðardóttir

Muut tekijät: Katso muut tekijät -osio.

Sarjat: Thóra Guðmundsdóttir (4)

JäseniäKirja-arvostelujaSuosituimmuussijaKeskimääräinen arvioMaininnat
3701268,703 (3.64)24
When all contact is lost with two Icelanders working in a harsh and sparsely populated area on the northeast coast of Greenland, Thóra is hired to investigate. Is there any connection with the disappearance of a woman from the site some months earlier? And why are the locals so hostile?
-
Ladataan...

Kirjaudu LibraryThingiin nähdäksesi, pidätkö tästä kirjasta vai et.

Ei tämänhetkisiä Keskustelu-viestiketjuja tästä kirjasta.

» Katso myös 24 mainintaa

Näyttää 1-5 (yhteensä 13) (seuraava | näytä kaikki)
This novel promised to be interesting because of its setting: A research station in Greenland, in the middle of winter. Unfortunately, I don't think that the author managed to play out the strengths and opportunities of this setting.

Dóra, a lawyer from Reykjavik, and her partner Matthias travel to Greenland in order to investigate the delays in a project of a mining company. All of the workers have left the station and refuse to return, and three people are missing.
While the premise is a great one, I found the execution lacking in plausibility. I was shaking my head at Dóra's actions most of the time. I also felt uncomfortable because of the depiction of the Inuit, who were exoticized throughout, setting "civilized" Iceland and Denmark against "wild" Greenland where everything is mysterious.
The plot itself has many strands, and there were a few that got me excited and made me turn the pages quicker, but the solution was much simpler than what I expected, which left me disappointed.

I will continue with the series because these books are good palate cleansers when I need a quick and easy read, and I have only two remaining in the series, but I do hope these will be better. ( )
  MissBrangwen | Dec 18, 2022 |
review of
Yrsa Sigurdardóttir's The Day is Dark
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - July 21-22, 2017

This is the 1st Nordic crime fiction I've read. The author's Icelandic, the action takes place mostly in Greenland. Perhaps Lars von Trier's The Element of Crime (1984) might qualify as my 1st exposure to the genre but there's probably something earlier than that that I'm not thinking of. Wd Ingmar Bergman's The Virgin Spring (1960) qualify? I associate the popularity of the genre, if it is popular, w/ Stieg Larsson's trilogy The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, all of wch were made into movies after the author's death in 2004 (according to Wikipedia). I've probably seen the movie made from The Girl who Kicked the Hornet's Nest. Still, this is the 1st of the bks I've read. A back cover review says ""Worthy of Stieg Larsson." —Kirkus Reviews"

The author is described on the back cover as being "a director of one of Iceland's largest engineering firms. Her work is found on bestseller lists all over the world." For the sheep readers, the people who're afraid to read anything that hasn't been preapproved for them by some sort of semi-delusional mass consumption, this last sentence is perfect. For a person like myself, it's a complete turn-off b/c my experience of what constitutes 'best-selling' is that robopaths flock to it - & robopaths are only literate enuf to read their marching orders, to consume their cult propaganda. I bought a used copy of this so I didn't contribute to the dubious statistics.

One of the things that impressed me about this the most, if "impressed" is the right word, is that the protagonist, a lawyer accustomed to doing divorce cases, mainly gets done what she gets done by being a reasonable level-headed person that people will trust & talk to. I suspect that these are professional qualities that "a director of one of Iceland's largest engineering firms" might respect. I respect them too. I also don't think they're necessarily likely to characterize most lawyers. Lawyers are, after all, in the business of 'winning' thru argumentation - wch generally involves all sorts of underhanded manipulation. Wd you trust a lawyer? I have friends who're lawyers, obviously we like each other b/c of interests in common & mutual respect. Still, the qualities of the lawyer hero, Thóra, as presented in this bk are a bit too idealized for them to be believable to me. She's a bit too trustworthy. Take away a lawyer's cushy economically spoiled lifestyle & you might have a cornered rat. SO, the mystery:

"She swallowed her disappointment. "Are the workers in Greenland?"

""No, they're in Iceland. All but two people who are probably still on-site. The others cam home during their allotted leave, but now refuse to return."

""What do you mean when you say that the two who remained behind are probably still on-site?"

""Nothing's been heard from them for around ten days, and they can't get hold of anyone there to go and find out what's happening. It's possible that the camp's communication system has simply failed, but apparently the only way to find out is to go there. If a logical explanation is found for their silence, it's conceivable that the other employees can be persuaded to return. That of course would be the best solution for the bank."" - pp 14-15

Thora's hired by a bank to try to solve a potentially financially damaging snag in a nascent mining operation in a sparsely populated area of Greenland. Taking the job appeals to her b/c there's some mystery involved & she's sick of divorce cases. The story is generally not a very happy one but there is a little humor early on:

"She leaned in and whispered, "Did you notice that Bella is the only other person awake?" Stealthily, she turned to check if this was still the case. "If she weren't here I could invite you to the toilet and initiate you into the mile high club." She looked Matthew in the eye and grinned. "Damn it, what a shame she had to come." She turned back to the window, pleased with herself." - p 38

As I'm sure you all realize, the mile high club is for people who dump their poop out to freeze in the high altitude while their partner parachutes attached to a line & catches it in a net. They then get reeled back in & beat the pooper w/ the frozen club.

Ok, ok, I'm joshin' ya, the mile high club is just a name for people who have sex on airplanes. But you probably already knew that.

One of the main characters is a hunter who still lives according to the traditional lifestyle. He observes the Icelandic company employees discretely from a distance: "It was not his job to rescue full-grown children who came here on a fool's errand. He would concentrate on saving the dog; it was far more important to him." (p 60) The hunter has important wisdom but it's framed in a belief system that's not acceptable to the more modern people around him.

An Icelandic author writes a bk about Greenland. I wonder how many people conflate Iceland & Greenland? I don't but I do associate the 2 even though I know that Greenland's colder & definitely not greener, etc..

"Thóra skimmed over the text. It didn't surprise her that it was thought that those who fist settled in Eastern Greenland around two thousand years ago had all died out. One migration and settlement followed another, but it always ended the same way: No one managed to survive for long in this harsh region. It wasn't until the eighteenth century that settlements started to thrive on the east coast, but in the nineteenth century the population started to decrease. One village after another fell to ruin after the villagers died from hunger or other hardships" - p 64

Sigurdardóttir does an excellent job of establishing a plethora of possible explanations for the still unknown fate of the missing persons & for the fate of the previous dead of the area: "Inuits believed that something called a Tupilak had killed them all." (p 67) When I think of something like a Tupilak, an apparently threatening curse or monster-like figure, I think of plans of ways to warn future people away from toxic waste areas w/ danger-lives that far exceed the likelihood of surrounding civilization lifespans. In other words, warnings that rely on imagery rather than language since the language may be long dead while the threatening imagery may still live on.

""I have a feeling this is probably some kind of Tupilak," said Friòrikka, pointing at the figurine. At first Thóra had found the figurine resembled a banana upon which something had been scratched, but when she looked more closely she saw that it was an intricately carved bone to which had been tied some strange-looking odds and ends: hair, some kind of leather, and a bird's claw. The craftsman appeared to have tried to make the bone itself resemble an ogre, and indeed the figurine looked quite monstrous. It had a large face with open jaws and numerous sharp teeth. Little hands with claws were carved into its belly but otherwise the monster was covered with a pattern that they couldn't understand, but that possibly symbolized something. On the figurine's back a tail could be distinguished." - p 115

"The woman frowned. "We're not bad to outsiders. We don't like the place you choose to live in. No one should be there; you are disturbing the evil that dwells there and by doing so you're putting us all in danger. We just want you to go somewhere else."" - p 134

As it turns out, the Greenlanders are correct in their warning but can't explain it in a way that seems anything but superstitious to the Icelanders so the warning is written off as being merely fanciful instead of representing a real danger. All sorts of things turn out to be correct.. but for the wrong reasons:

""Didn't those bastard Greenlanders just sabotage the equipment?" asked Eyjólfur immediately. "They'd certainly be capable of it."

""What the hell are you talking about, boy?" snapped the doctor. "Why would they want to sabotage anything here? I'm certain I know more about the natives of this country than you do, and I can tell you for sure that they're the kindest of people and wish no one ill."

""Except for their women," interrupted Friòrikka. "They're not particularly kind to them." Again she seemed to regret having spoken, and pressed her lips shut.

"The doctor harrumphed, then said, "The way that a particular people or race handles alcohol says nothing about its disposition. Alcohol doesn't really bring out the best in Icelanders either. What if we were deprived of our sustenance, like these people have been because of bleeding-heart liberal Westerners banning the hunting they depend upon?"" - p 90

What if everyone's a little bit right & a little bit wrong? Then there's the whole process of sifting thru it all & not throwing out the baby w/ the bathwater. There's definitely some clear-headed wisdom in this bk, & I admire it for that, but it strikes me as the type of wisdom that a person can have, an author can have, when they have a comfortable distance from actual problems that they may never have to directly experience the miseries of - b/c, if they did, they'd be just as destroyed by it, if not more so, than the people immersed in it from birth usually are.

The hunter, Igimaq, tries to fulfill what he considers his duty by warning people away from the cursed area. Alas, the distance between the culture he represents & the culture he's trying to warn is too great, the problem is more than a language gap - wch, in itself, is usually more than enuf to cause problems. He decides to appeal to his old friend who has some power in the community as a tribal elder & who at least partially understands the problem: "No one would listen to him that way. Besides, it was only this former friend of his who knew the story and so would hopefully understand the gravity of the situation immediately. Unless he had lost his connection with his roots." (p 107)

""Don't you remember what we were taught, Sikki?" The hunter stared at his friend. "We are responsible for this area." He recalled as if it were yesterday how the two of them had been entrusted with this task; Igimaq because he was a direct descendant of the greatest hunters in the village on his father's side, and Sikki because he was in line to become the next angekokk, or shaman, as his father and grandfather had been before him." - p 155

Another mysterious artifact is found: "After most of the ice had been removed from it, it turned out to be a bone that had been polished, with holes drilled in two places in the middle. A leather strap had been tied to it at both ends, meaning that above all, it resembled a giant's armband." (p 108) One might be tempted to jump to a conclusion that it's another relic similar to the Tupilak. After all, it's a bone w/ pieces of leather tied to it. But one of the strongest lessons of this bk is don't jump to conclusions or you'll never figure out the truth.

As w/ most mysteries, suspicion is cast on various characters:

"No doubt the therapist would quickly lose his appetite if Arnar started to describe the events leading to his fall. Terrible, mindless vengeance and violence—and not from someone who kills for survival but from him, a supposedly civilized human being. And toward his colleagues, too . . . He felt sick when he recalled the reasons behind his actions. But though the others' behavior toward him had been disgraceful, he alone was responsible for what had happened. And for that, he couldn't blame alcohol." - p 112

"Naruana could only hope that Igimaq didn't know what his son had done, how low he had stooped. Hope that he hadn't seen him as he stood there, his hands stained with the blood of a prey no hunter would boast about." - p 128

"Arnar turned his back to the wall. "What do you think about killing animals?" he asked.

""Me?" asked the young woman, as if he could have meant someone else. "I don't find it pleasant to think about, but it's okay if the animals are meant to be eaten."

""And people?" asked Arnar, without changing his expression or his tone of voice. "Is that all right?"" - p 151

"Friòrikka sounded skeptical. "You know, I read somewhere that in the old days the Greenlanders never had any actual religion. In place of faith they lived with fear." Friòrikka's breathing was regular, as if she were drifting off and speaking almost in her sleep. "That's how I feel. I'm not religious but I feel a persistent fear of something, though I don't know what."" - p 183

If the following is accurate then Greenland is more interesting to me than ever:

"It was an ancient custom; those who lived together in small groups could not afford discord, meaning that those who raised their voices or bickered with each other were looked down on. The only way to express one's disapproval was to remain silent, because words spoken in anger had a way of snowballing, intensifying and provoking hostility that would eventually put the survival of the entire community at risk. The Greenlandic language was thus free of invective and Igimaq was not about to start swearing in Danish." - p 264

That's certainly a lesson that more people shd learn.

There're times when I suspect authors of saying just enuf to stimulate the reader to figure out at least one aspect of a mystery shortly before the answer is presented in full.

"Eyjólfur frowned. "I don't know. He wasn't so awful that people would have thought about killing him." He looked awkwardly at Friòrikka in the hope of support. "Right? It wasn't like that, was it?"

"Friòrikka looked from him to her lap. "No. Definitely not." She abruptly fell silent. It was as if all the air had gone out of her." - p 355

It was after the reading the above (& what led up to it) that I realized who killed _____ & why. I felt satisfied w/ myself when my theory was verified shortly thereafter. I'll bet there's even a term for when authors nudge the reader into solving a problem.

All in all, I admit to begrudgingly finding this bk wise & well thought thru. One of the things that makes my praise for it "begrudging" is that the writing style fairly screams of SOON-TO-BE-A-MAJOR-MOTION-PICTURE - but maybe it's not brutal or shocking enuf for that. ( )
  tENTATIVELY | Apr 3, 2022 |
Three workers on a mining project in eastern Greenland have met their ends in mysterious circumstances. One walked into the snow and never came back, while the other two were simply not heard from ever again. Understandably, the rest of the workers on the project are agitated, and there is a risk of the project not being completed. Thora is hired by the bank underwriting the insurance for the project, to see if there’s a way to end the contract or to get the project working again.

This was a delightfully creepy closed-circle mystery. The remote location heightened the tension, and the cutting back and forth between different storylines kept me turning the pages to find out what happened. I also liked the lighter interludes of Thora’s conflict with Bella and parenting (and grandparenting) at a distance. And the setting was a draw as well, particularly the lingustic aspects. I found it interesting that Thora knew Danish because she had taken it in high school.

Thora is an excellent Icelandic crime fiction protagonist, and if you haven’t met her yet, you should. ( )
  rabbitprincess | Nov 27, 2017 |
Very good, fell right back into this series after a long time away. ( )
  libgirl69 | Apr 13, 2017 |
Thora Gudmundsdottir is a single mother, an unexpected grandmother, a struggling lawyer and a magnet for mysteries. Sitting in her office one afternoon wishing for something more riveting than pre-nuptial agreements to come across her desk Thora receives a call from her boyfriend Matthew, offering her a chance to do some investigative work for a bank fearing a huge investment loss at a Greenland research facility. Despite her craving for some excitement she is reluctant to travel so far away but takes the job anyway. Researchers have disappeared under very mysterious circumstances and a strange video of the last two at the facility sheds no light on what happened to them other than it was something grizzly.

Ms. Siguroardottir’s other Thora mysteries have all taken place in Iceland so I was a little apprehensive about the Greenland setting for this one. I needn’t have been. The author does a wonderful job of describing the setting, remote as it is and I learned a lot about the history and just how remote Greenland really is. The story itself, however, left a little to be desired. While her other books moved along at a fairly brisk pace and held my interest with Icelandic superstitions and folk tales as well as the plotline, the book moved a little to slowly. It still contained facts and local lore (Greenland-ic) but the plot itself dragged. I felt there were too many possibilities and too many players in The Day is Dark.

Here’s to hoping that the next installment in the series takes the reader back to Iceland, Thora’s family and the interesting mysteries I have come to expect.
( )
  ChristineEllei | Jul 14, 2015 |
Näyttää 1-5 (yhteensä 13) (seuraava | näytä kaikki)
This is possibly the first crime novel ever set in Greenland. The sleuthing is carried out very nicely by a female Reykjavik lawyer who’s looking into the disappearance of an Icelandic research team in remotest Greenland. Sigurdardottir tends to be long winded, but she’s good on character and atmosphere. And she leaves readers with an indelible message: stay far, far away from Greenland’s winters.
lisäsi VivienneR | muokkaaThe Toronto Star, Jack Batten (Dec 31, 2011)
 

» Lisää muita tekijöitä (4 mahdollista)

Tekijän nimiRooliTekijän tyyppiKoskeeko teosta?Tila
Yrsa Sigurðardóttirensisijainen tekijäkaikki painoksetlaskettu
Flecken, TinaÜbersetzermuu tekijäeräät painoksetvahvistettu
Rögnvaldsdóttir, Áslaug Th.Kääntäjämuu tekijäeräät painoksetvahvistettu
Roughton, PhilipKääntäjämuu tekijäeräät painoksetvahvistettu
Sinun täytyy kirjautua sisään voidaksesi muokata Yhteistä tietoa
Katso lisäohjeita Common Knowledge -sivuilta (englanniksi).
Teoksen kanoninen nimi
Tiedot englanninkielisestä Yhteisestä tiedosta. Muokkaa kotoistaaksesi se omalle kielellesi.
Alkuteoksen nimi
Teoksen muut nimet
Alkuperäinen julkaisuvuosi
Henkilöt/hahmot
Tiedot englanninkielisestä Yhteisestä tiedosta. Muokkaa kotoistaaksesi se omalle kielellesi.
Tärkeät paikat
Tiedot englanninkielisestä Yhteisestä tiedosta. Muokkaa kotoistaaksesi se omalle kielellesi.
Tärkeät tapahtumat
Kirjaan liittyvät elokuvat
Epigrafi (motto tai mietelause kirjan alussa)
Omistuskirjoitus
Tiedot englanninkielisestä Yhteisestä tiedosta. Muokkaa kotoistaaksesi se omalle kielellesi.
This book is dedicated to my sister,
Laufey Ýr Sigurdardóttir.
Ensimmäiset sanat
Tiedot englanninkielisestä Yhteisestä tiedosta. Muokkaa kotoistaaksesi se omalle kielellesi.
Oddný Hildur looked away from the computer screen, took the headphones from her ears and listened. (Prologue)
Sitaatit
Viimeiset sanat
Tiedot englanninkielisestä Yhteisestä tiedosta. Muokkaa kotoistaaksesi se omalle kielellesi.
Erotteluhuomautus
Julkaisutoimittajat
Kirjan kehujat
Alkuteoksen kieli
Tiedot saksankielisestä Yhteisestä tiedosta. Muokkaa kotoistaaksesi se omalle kielellesi.
Kanoninen DDC/MDS
Kanoninen LCC

Viittaukset tähän teokseen muissa lähteissä.

Englanninkielinen Wikipedia

-

When all contact is lost with two Icelanders working in a harsh and sparsely populated area on the northeast coast of Greenland, Thóra is hired to investigate. Is there any connection with the disappearance of a woman from the site some months earlier? And why are the locals so hostile?

Kirjastojen kuvailuja ei löytynyt.

Kirjan kuvailu
Yhteenveto haiku-muodossa

Current Discussions

-

Suosituimmat kansikuvat

Pikalinkit

Arvio (tähdet)

Keskiarvo: (3.64)
0.5
1
1.5
2 5
2.5 4
3 19
3.5 12
4 35
4.5 2
5 9

Oletko sinä tämä henkilö?

Tule LibraryThing-kirjailijaksi.

Minotaur Books

Minotaur Books on julkaissut painoksen tästä kirjasta.

» Kustantajan sivusto

 

Lisätietoja | Ota yhteyttä | LibraryThing.com | Yksityisyyden suoja / Käyttöehdot | Apua/FAQ | Blogi | Kauppa | APIs | TinyCat | Perintökirjastot | Varhaiset kirja-arvostelijat | Yleistieto | 203,233,723 kirjaa! | Yläpalkki: Aina näkyvissä