Cage by Lilja Sigurdardóttir (tr. by Quentin Bates) #BookReview #BlogTour

The prison doors slam shut behind Agla, when her sentence ends, but her lover Sonja is not there to meet her.

As a group of foreign businessmen tries to draw Agla into an ingenious fraud that stretches from Iceland around the world, Agla and her former nemesis, María find the stakes being raised at a terrifying speed.

Ruthless drug baron Ingimar will stop at nothing to protect his empire, but he has no idea about the powder keg he is sitting on in his own home.

At the same time, a deadly threat to Sonya and her family brings her from London back to Iceland, where she needs to settle scores with longstanding adversaries if she wants to stay alive.

 With a shocking crescendo, the lives of these characters collide, as drugs, smuggling, big money and political intrigue rally with love, passion, murder and betrayal until the winner takes all … in the masterful, explosive conclusion to the award-winning Reykjavík Noir trilogy.

I'm delighted to be hosting the blog tour for Cage today. Many thanks to Lilja Sigurdardóttir, Orenda Books and Anne Cater from Random Things Tours for inviting me and for my advance copy of the novel.

Cage is the final book in Lilja Sigurdardóttir's Reykjavik Noir trilogy and while it can be read as a standalone, I would recommend reading the previous books, Snare and Trap in order to truly appreciate the development of the characters over the series. Quentin Bates has once again translated the book into English and as always has ensured the language flows as beautifully as it did in its native Icelandic. 

The lead character in the first two novels, Sonja has a smaller role to play here with her former lover, Agla at the forefront of the action. Some of her financial crimes have finally caught up with her and at the start of the book, she is coming to the end of a prison sentence. She is clearly in a fragile mental state, her time spent in jail has caged her physically but she has also become trapped by her sense of loss and subsequent apathy. However, a new prisoner, Elísa sparks something within her and at the same time she is asked to look into potential fraud in the aluminium storage business. 

Corporate fraud may not sound like the most compelling theme for a crime novel but I found it really refreshing to read a book which isn't about murder. Lilja Sigurdardóttir explores the darker underbelly of society here but even though there can be no disguising of the fact that these are unscrupulous and often dangerous individuals, there is something fascinating about their motivations and their complicated relationships.

Agla is not the only character in a cage of sorts; Sonja may be a very different woman from the unfortunate victim she appeared to be in Snare but she is still trapped by a business which she know she has to always stay one step ahead in or risk her own - and more importantly - her son, Tómas - safety. She has been forced to live an almost reclusive life in London, constantly changing the travel routes Tómas must take when he comes to visit her. Her dream of being able to live peacefully with her son is over as he must spend most of his time at boarding school or with his father. Even when they are together, they are accompanied by bodyguard, Alex. The cage in her London home has a physical presence too as it quickly becomes evident that this is a more ruthless Sonja who is prepared to do whatever it takes to keep her adversaries in check.

Meanwhile, Ingimar is trapped by his family situation too. Constantly tempted to cheat on his alcoholic, depressed wife, he has now often reached the point where he just can't be bothered and instead has become increasingly reliant on his visits to a dominatrix. He clearly adores his teenage son, Anton but struggles to understand him at a time when the boy really needs a guiding hand. A gripping sub-plot sees Anton devising a terrible plan to impress his girlfriend, Júlía and is a terrifying exploration of how the hateful polemic which has infiltrated discussions about immigration, culture and religion can influence impressionable minds. 

Agla has to join forces with her former nemesis, Maria whose own fall from grace means she now runs an online investigative journalism site, with her office in the same building as Radio Edda, a hate radio station which poisons the airways with its constant barrage of Islamophobic invective. Her marriage is over and her precarious financial situation means she has little choice but to agree to help Agla investigate the irregularities in the aluminium trade and it is striking to see the contrast between the lives of the two women. Despite Agla's criminal record, she continues to hold all the cards, having never lost her large fortune or her influential position in the financial world. Maria, on the other hand struggles for money and is the one who ends up imprisoned and in real danger as she travels to America on a perilous fact-finding mission for Agla. 

However, Agla doesn't really lead such a charmed life and is perhaps the poster girl for money not buying happiness. She has to decide whether she is prepared to take a chance on love again after being so hurt by the abrupt way in which Sonja ended their relationship. As the various storylines are gradually brought together, the final few chapters become increasingly tense and then the conclusion to the series is surprisingly touching and though not what I would have expected earlier in the trilogy, is just the perfect way to leave these complex characters and this superb series which has kept me engaged throughout, 

Cage is published by Orenda Books, publishing links can be found here.

Don't miss the rest of the blog tour, details are below.

About the Author

Icelandic crime-writer Lilja Sigurdardóttir was born in the town of Akranes in 1972 and raised in Mexico, Sweden, Spain and Iceland. An award-winning playwright, Lilja has written four crime novels, with Snare, the first in a new series, hitting bestseller lists worldwide. The film rights have been bought by Palomar Pictures in California. She lives in Reykjavík with her partner.
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