My first introduction to the works of Ragnar Jonasson was Nightblind. I read Nightblind in 2018 and while i was reading book 2 in the series, the series was already up to book #5. Additionally, Ragnar started a second series in 2018 the Hidden Island series. That series was up to book #3 in 2021 when I read The Darkness.. Anyway, as I discovered the books I got really confused about what book number I read in what series! Here is book ! in the Hidden Iceland Series The Darkness

The Darkness

The Darkness features Detective Inspector Hulda Hermannsdóttir of the Reykjavík police. A 64 year-old widow she is waiting out her time until she can retire at 65. However, her employers have other ideas and soon Hulda is forced into an early retirement. She is given two weeks to go home and wait until her official retirement begins.

Rather than being allowed to  continue to work  on her caseload, she is told she can work on a cold case of her choice.

Hulda chooses the case of a young Russian woman whose body had washed up on an Icelandic shore a year earlier. A cursory investigation was completed. The death was declared a suicide and the case is quietly closed.

As Hulda starts to dig into the case, she quickly realizes it may not have been a suicide but rather a murder.

As the novel progresses the reader is provided two parallel story lines told in flashbacks

One story line involves a mother who had to place her illegitimate baby daughter in a care facility because she couldn’t afford to take care of her. And their struggles throughout the child’s life.

The other story is about a young women who is taken on a trip to an isolated and dangerous valley in the Icelandic mountains.

All three converge to provide a very dramatic ending to The Darkness.

Gregg Hurwitz’s writes on the cover of The Darkness ..” I dare you not to be shocked” and I do too !!

Final Thoughts 

The bottom line – I really liked the book. I thought Hulda’s character the was both interesting and well developed. Additionally, I also know that I had some of the same feelings as I approached and moved into retirement. Now, I can’t wait to move onto The Island and The Mist

Links

Author’s Website
Goodreads
Amazon

About Ragnar Jonasson

Ragnar Jonasson is author of the award winning and international bestselling Dark Iceland series.

His debut Snowblind, first in the Dark Iceland series, went to number one in the Amazon Kindle charts shortly after publication. The book was also a no. 1 Amazon Kindle bestseller in Australia. Snowblind has been a paperback bestseller in France.

Nightblind won the Dead Good Reader Award 2016 for Most Captivating Crime in Translation.

Snowblind was called a “classically crafted whodunit” by THE NEW YORK TIMES, and it was selected by The Independent as one of the best crime novels of 2015 in the UK.

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Originally posted in December 2018 -updated Nov 2025

Nightblind is the second book in Ragnar Jonnasson’s Dark Iceland series. It is the first book by Jonasson that I have read. Since the I have read 4 out of the 6 books in the series. It seems that I am constantly re

The Story

Siglufjörður is an isolated village only accessible via a small mountain tunnel. The small close-knit town is one where no one locks their doors. In Nightblind their world is rocked when a policeman is killed at a quiet house with a disturbing past.

The murdered officer was Ari Thór’s partner. Thor would have been on-duty the night of the murder but he had called out sick. Thor and the town’s former police chief are tasked with the job of unraveling the mystery. It’s complex mystery involving the compromised new mayor. Along the way the reader is also given glimpses of a psychiatric ward in Reykjavik where a patient writes about his confinement and the reason for it!

My Thoughts

All in all, it was a good visit. I enjoyed both the plot and the characters. Nightblind is the second book in Jonasson’s  Dark Iceland series.and you can bet I’ll be visiting Iceland again. First, to find out what happened prior to Nightblind in Snowblind and then after in Blackout! I can’t wait.

Ragnar Jonasson – “IS THIS THE BEST CRIME WRITER IN THE WORLD TODAY?” (THE TIMES) // “NEXT-GEN NORDIC STAR” (LA TIMES)

After visiting Ragnar’s website I discovered the following

Nightblind has won the 2016 Mörda Award – Dead Good Reader Award for Most Captivating Crime in Translation. Nightblind, translated by Quentin Bates and published by Orenda Books, is is the second book in the Dark Iceland series to be published in the UK.

Links

Author’s Website
Facebook
Twitter
Goodreads
Amazon

About Ragnar Jonasson

Jonasson is author of the award winning and international bestselling Dark Iceland series.

His debut Snowblind, first in the Dark Iceland series, went to number one in the Amazon Kindle charts shortly after publication. The book was also a no. 1 Amazon Kindle bestseller in Australia. Snowblind has been a paperback bestseller in France.

Nightblind won the Dead Good Reader Award 2016 for Most Captivating Crime in Translation.

Snowblind was called a “classically crafted whodunit” by THE NEW YORK TIMES, and it was selected by The Independent as one of the best crime novels of 2015 in the UK.

Rights to the Dark Iceland series have been sold to UK, USA, France, Germany, Italy, Canada, Australia, Poland, Turkey, South Korea, Japan, Morocco,”’

Goodreads

• The Mörda Award was a specific category within the Dead Good Reader Awards, celebrating the best in translated crime fiction. The Dead Good Reader Awards were annual, public-voted prizes for crime and thriller novels, presented during the Theakstons Old Peculier Crime Writing Festival in Harrogate, UK. 

• Purpose: To recognize and celebrate a captivating crime novel that has been translated into English.
• Winner example: In 2016, the Mörda Award for Captivating Crime in Translation was won by Ragnar Jonasson’s Nightblind,

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