This is an Arctic krimi set in Sápmi in the far north where Finland, Sweden, and Norway converge along with Russia.
Once this area was called Lappland after its inhabitants, Lapps. It is bounded by the Barents Sea, White Sea, and Norwegian Sea. The land border is not so clear.
In winter there are forty days without sun, and this novel opens just as the sun is about to show itself again, starting with a scant glimpse of six degrees over the horizon, like a 10-watt light in the back of a freezer hidden behind something. Just the top arc shows. But when it reappears after forty days, everyone stops to watch for it.
The Sami are nomadic herders who follow and live off reindeer, borders mean nothing to either the reindeer or the Sami. The Reindeer Police Administration is, according to this novel, a response to this situation. It has multi-national jurisdiction in the Sami areas of Finland, Sweden, and Norway, but not Russia.
Our protagonists are Reindeer Police Patrol 9, consisting of a senior officer, Klemet, who is Sami and who seems to have a Swedish birth certificate, and a younger Norwegian woman, Nina. They ride around on snowmobiles keeping an eye on the herds and the herders to prevent disputes among the herders and between them and other locals, though there are few of these. Klemet broods a lot.
A very exotic location with lots about the place, the weather, the aurora borealis, different kinds of ice, the past, the tensions, including some left over from the Cold War with the biggest home to Sami, Russia.
A pathetic Sami reindeer herder is murdered and at the same time a Sami artefact at a local museum is stolen. Are the two events connected. and if so how? Some of the locals think the only good Sami is a dead one, and say so. Moreover, the local police have little interest in Reindeer Police Patrol 9. Nor do the real Norwegians, real Swedes, or real Finns care about the murder of a Sami alcoholic out on the tundra, nor about any useless artefact, viewing the Sami as a nuisance or hinderance.
But in the course of sorting out the aftermath concerning the victim’s reindeer our protagonists see connections between the murder and the theft. The plot is clever and the place is compelling. Klemet is rather too self-absorbed for me, but he does snap out of it occasionally. The most arresting character is the firecracker who is head of the Nordic Geological Institute who becomes involved. The most formidable is the Sami herder Aslak who lives the old way and seems almost to be a part of land itself. The author distinguishes effectively amongst quite a cast of characters.
I liked the way the Sami culture plays into the mystery with the artefact but also in other ways. Klemet’s uncle with his girlfriend prove what a small world it is.
I wondered about language barriers. Kelmet speaks Swedish. Nina is Norwegian. According to Wikipedia the Sami peoples have many languages. The locals are mostly Norwegians, but there are some Finns and even a Russian or two.
Olivier Truc
It is translated from French, which surprised me given the intensity and variety of local knowledge on display I had assumed the author would be of that place and write in one of the languages of that place.
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