The Quiet Mother

A Detective Konrad Novel
By Arnaldur Indriðason
Translated by Philip Roughton

I got my start in reading Icelandic Mysteries at just about the same time I started this blog. Jar City was the first, and the first title by Arnaldur as well. 12 million copies later, this title came out. A pre-Covid novel, it was published in Icelandic in 2019 only released in English in 2025.

Dectective Konrad is retired from the Reykjavík police force yet still receives request for assistance, in this case from Valborg, a woman who is looking for a chld she gave up for adoption nearly 50 years prior. When the woman is murdered, Konrad’s sense of duty brings him onto the case, augmenting and sometimes crossing Marta, the official investigator. Konrad has mysteries from his own past, notably his charlatan con-man father who ran fake seances with a partner as a way of fleecing wealthy widows. His father had been murdered too, and the thread of connection between the two stories is in its supernatural elements, real or contrived.

The city of Reykjavík is really another main character, those familiar with it will enjoy the extra dimension it brings to the proceedings. Specal note must be made of the integration to the plot of legendary nightclub Glaumbær, which burned in 1971. It was located where the National Gallery now sits, in almost the exact spot where the apartment where I usually stay in the city. This is one of Arnaldur’s better plots—it’s not just a rehash of earlier books. His writing, always concise, is honed to a razor edge here and is very readable, new characters are introduced naturally, and even the Icelandic names are easy to follow. There are deep human currents here, Arnaldur handles these with tact and grace. Philip Roughton’s translation is unfussy and elegant. One caveat: The cover photograph has nothing to do with the story. It would have been nice of they could have had a picture of Glaumbær or some other city landmark that was featured in the story.

Highly recommended.

More on Arnaldur here…