Ah, Alabama, where the skies are blue, and Confederate flags still abound. It doesn’t seem the most likely place to set a mystery novel but Icelandic writer Hildur Sif Thorarensen decided to buck the trend and trade Scandinavia for the south-eastern U.S. state in her second novel, His Sweet. His Sweet is a riveting...
My first trip to Iceland was as a meat-eater and the only time I had any difficulty was deciding which of the plethora of daytrips to take. Returning several years later as a vegetarian, things became trickier. In downtown Reykjavik, there was Glo, a health food restaurant that, while serving one meat dish, was...
Back in the mid-nineties, a teenage Ísold Uggadóttir left her hometown in Iceland to live and study German in Berlin. In her new residence, Isold was staying with a “highly political” woman in her sixties and three pet cats. It sounds cosy, except that Isold soon noticed the woman was staying up late at night – later,...
It’s long been touted as the land of equality: the world’s first lesbian Prime Minister, equal pay for women and one of the happiest countries on the map. But as crime writer Ragnar Jonasson notes, Iceland still has far to go when it comes to women in the police force. “Women have always been a minority,” he says,...
A shiny red metal heart stands erect in the garden at Oslo Cathedral in the city centre. Bold letters spell out the words in Norwegian, followed by the English translation: Greatest of all is love. Even for a tourist like myself, a translation is almost unnecessary; just the sight of the heart and the accompanying...
July is Pride Month so, to celebrate, here’s our pick of Scandinavia’s best queer cinema. No list is ever complete, of course, so think of this as merely an entrée – or perhaps a good way to recover from the plethora of pride festivities. SWEDEN Show Me Love/ Fucking Åmål Agnes (left) and Elin from Show Me Love. On...
When the sun’s out in Copenhagen, you have to make the most of it. Luckily, it’s been a great summer this year. Better yet, no matter where you are in the city, there are plenty of great places to watch the sun set. (And yes, The Round Tower is one of them, but current opening hours mean that it’s generally shut...
Dear Iceland, Until I touched down at Keflavik airport, I didn’t believe in love at first sight. The very idea seemed too wishy-washy, too cliched. But just glimpsing your otherworldly landscape from the window of the plane, I knew I’d made the right decision in coming here to meet you at last. Like your aurora...
The underground tunnel which connects one side of a busy Nørrebro street with another smells like piss, but it does the job. Today, traffic is frantic and attempting to cross any other way would surely be folly. I reckon it’s a safe assumption that most tourists don’t come this far into Copenhagen (based on the fact...
It is stranger than fiction and more frightening than any Nordic Noir drama, yet the unsettling disappearances of Guðmundur Einarsson and Geirfinnur Einarsson in 1974 still continue to haunt and fascinate Iceland today. Even for those who haven’t kept up with the case, it’s pretty easy not to become intrigued by the...
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