November, 1967, Iceland. Fourteen-year-old Marsí has a secret penpal – a boy who lives on the other side of the country – but she has been writing to him in her older sister’s name. Now she is excited to meet him for the first time.
But when the date arrives, Marsí is prevented from going, and during the night her sister Stína goes missing – her bloodstained anorak later found at the place where Marsí and her penpal had agreed to meet.
November, 1977. Stína’s disappearance remains unsolved. Then an unexpected letter arrives for Marsí It’s from her penpal, and he’s still out there…
Desperate for news of her missing sister, but terrified that he might coming after her next, Marsí returns to her hometown and embarks on an investigation of her own.
But Marsí has always had trouble distinguishing her vivid dreams from reality, and as insomnia threatens her sanity, it seems she can’t even trust her own memories.
And her sister’s killer is still on the loose…
I'm delighted to be sharing my thoughts on Home Before Dark by Eva Björg Ægisdóttir today but must apologise for the delay in posting. I thought my blog tour date was later in the month and only realised my error late in the day. Many thanks to Orenda Books and Anne Cater from Random Things Tours for inviting me.
Eva Björg Ægisdóttir's Forbidden Iceland series is one of my favourites and although Home Before Dark is a standalone, I knew I could expect another meticulously plotted, atmospheric story. Of the highest order. The novel has a dual timeline but both strands are set in the past and follow the events before and after the disappearance of sixteen year old Kristin – Stína – Karvelsdóttir in 1967 and ten years later in November 1977. It's Stína's younger sister, Marsi who is the focus of the book, however, and Home Before Dark is a powerful, disturbing tale of loss, secrets and memories.
Every November, Marsi reluctantly makes the trip back to her hometown to mark the sad anniversary of Stína vanishing without a trace beyond her bloodied anorak found at the scene. Ten years on, she still doesn't know what happened to her sister but after living with the crippling belief that her lies were responsible for Stína's fate, Marsi is terrified when she is contacted by the person she believes took her sister. A person she still doesn't know the identity of...
As a young teenager in 1967, living in the shadow of her beautiful, talented, popular older sister, Marsi decides to pretend to be Stína when writing to her new penpal. Her reasoning is innocent enough, albeit rather sad, as she realises she can reinvent herself as the cheerful, radiant Stina instead of sulky Marsi. However, there are far-reaching consequences to the night she arranged to meet the boy she believes she has been conversing with; she is convinced that as she failed to attend their rendezvous, it's no coincidence that Stína went missing the same night.
Having not heard from the penpal for ten years, a letter revealing they know the truth about her identity becomes the catalyst for her to start investigating the circumstances of ten years ago herself. Meanwhile the chapters set in 1967 often follow Stína and give us a clearer view of who she was – and perhaps more insightfully, who the people in her life were, and what her relationship with them was like. Eva Björg Ægisdóttir excels at gradually drip-feeding the revelations that the dynamics between family and friends weren't as loving and uncomplicated as they might have first appeared, It means the creeping sense of dread leading up to Stína's disappearance is arguably felt even more strongly in 1977 as Marsi realises she perhaps didn’t know Stína as well as she thought and that she can’t be sure who she can really trust.
The town itself is fictional but the advantages and, more importantly, the claustrophobic demands of living in the country are perceptively portrayed here. The apparent freedom of rural youngsters who are given unfettered access to run wild as the responsibility of the whole town is juxtaposed by the stifling flipside of feeling trapped by the insidious expectations and intrusive entanglements of such communities. The oppressive sense of place is almost palpable but Eva Björg Ægisdóttir also vividly captures the imposing, beautiful surroundings of this sparsely populated area of Iceland.
Home Before Dark is a rather melancholic story and the weight of disappointment, envy and regret of those who have never escaped the suffocating atmosphere of the town mingles chillingly with the dark secrets that have been kept for years, including the poignant exploration of the 'situation girls' one of the more shameful chapters of Icelandic history. Although not the main subject of this book, the descriptions of awful treatment of the girls and young women who were labelled as deviants and sent to institutions after being accused of having relations with foreign soldiers allow for both a moving acknowledgment of their plight and an empathetic look at generational trauma. A word here too for Victoria Cribb's fine translation which captures all the nuances of this clever novel.
The shocking truth isn't fully revealed until the end but as this complex, menacing psychological thriller slowly gives up its wretched, harrowing secrets. Eva Björg Ægisdóttir reminds us why she has been compared to Ruth Rendell. Home Before Dark is unsettling, compelling crime writing at its very best. Highly recommended.
Home Before Dark is published by Orenda Books, other purchasing links can be found here.
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About the Author
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Ever since she was a child she has been fascinated with books. She soon started writing, although at first it was mostly diaries and half-finished stories. As a teenager she won a short story contest and after that she was determined to become a writer in the future. After moving back to Iceland in 2015, she decided to finally start writing her first novel. Being a mother, she knew it would be difficult to find time to write having the usual 9 - 5 job. In order to have time to write, she got a job as a flight attendant and in nine months she finished the first draft of her novel.
In 2018, Eva was the recipient of the Blackbird Award, a crime-writing prize hosted by prolific Iceland authors Yrsa Sigurdardóttir and Ragnar Jónasson, for her debut novel Marrid Í Stiganum (The Creak on the Stairs), which was published in spring 2020 by Orenda Books and went on to win the CWA John Creasey New Blood Dagger 2021. She is now the author of six crime novels, with more in the pipeline.
About the Translator
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