Land van dromen

Minnesota Trilogy #1

by Vidar Sundstøl, Carla Joustra (Translator), Lucy Pijttersen (Translator)

Lake Superior, Minnesota. Politieman Lance Hansen krijgt een melding dat er illegaal wordt gekampeerd aan de oever van het meer. Als hij er gaat kijken, stuit hij op een naakte, bebloede en verwarde man die het bos in vlucht. Hansen volgt de man en vindt een tent met daarnaast het lijk van een andere naakte man met ingeslagen schedel.
De gevluchte man, de Noor Bjørn Hauglie, wordt gearresteerd. Hauglie had een relatie met het slachtoffer. De politie kan echter niet bewijzen dat Hauglie een crime passionnel heeft gepleegd en hij wordt vrijgelaten.
Hansen, een Amerikaan met Noorse voorouders en een enthousiast amateurhistoricus, duikt in de lokale geschiedenis. Is dit inderdaad de eerste moord in het district, zoals collega’s beweren? In de archieven ontdekt Hansen dat lang geleden een medicijnman van de Ojibway, de oorspronkelijke bewoners van het gebied, spoorloos is verdwenen. Zijn lichaam is nooit gevonden. Wel kwam er een gewonde Noorse jongen uit het bos tevoorschijn.

De FBI gaat ondertussen door met het moordonderzoek. Twee mogelijke verdachten komen in beeld: Hansens broer Andy en Lenny Driver, een Ojibway-indiaan. Tijdens zijn eigen onderzoek stuit Lance Hansen op duistere familiegeheimen die zich tot in het heden uitstrekken. Door omstandigheden gedwongen moet hij uiteindelijk een dramatische keuze maken tussen plicht en familietrouw.

Genres: Mystery, Fiction, Crime, Mystery Thriller, Thriller, Book Club, Scandinavian Literature

319 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Norwegian author, born in 1963. Lives in Telemark, Southern Norway. Married to Shea Sundstøl (California, US).

Reviews

[Suzy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have been mulling over what to say about this book all day! The story of the murder of a Norwegian tourist in late June on the north shore of Lake Superior definitely drew me in. But that statement about "the story" isn't quite accurate.

Lance Hansen, U.S. forest service policeman, finds the body of one of two young Norwegian men while checking out a complaint about illegal camping. He finds his companion alive, naked and covered in blood at Boraga Cross, a landmark along the lake. Lance just happens to be the genealogy obsessed local historian of the development of the area since Europeans discovered and settled there. Sundstol uses Lance's knowledge to tell us all about the history of the the area, of the Scandinavians who settled there and the impact of this on the Ojibwe, Native Americans already living there. Oh, and there just happens to be a murder to solve. Since it is on federal land, the FBI are in charge of the investigation, assisted by Eerik Nyland, a cop who comes over from Norway to help out.

My impressions:
I felt like Sundstol, who lived on the North Shore for 2 years, overdid the historical information, as if he was teaching us all of what he had learned.
There was an interesting mystical element drawn from the history of the Ojibwe.
The book lulled me into the story vs. propelling me through the book. I thought the low-key nature of the writing was very in keeping with the Norwegian demeanor.
This felt as much like a psychological portrayal of the struggles of a cop - Lance - as it did a mystery. Lance kept a lot inside himself, but we were privy to his inner conversation throughout the book and those conversations are what propelled the story forward.

While I wasn't wowed, I did enjoy the book. It surprised me how fast a read it was given the slower pace of the story development. I will definitely keep an eye out for future translations of The Minnesota Trilogy as this trio of books is called.

[Sue · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not your average or normal murder mystery. Yes there is a murder, a young Norwegian tourist, visiting northern Minnesota with his best friend on a canoing holiday. Local Forest Service police officer Lance Hansen found one man alive and covered in blood, the other dead, terribly battered. To this point, the story is somewhat straight forward. What follows is less so, involving lengthy historical background on Norwegian settlement of the area, the Ojibway peoples and culture, the gradual changes in northern lake country and Hansen's personal love of local history and genealogy.

A policeman is dispatched from Norway to assist the investigation which takes various directions over the course of the novel. We follow the case from various viewpoints while also following the history. Those who want a straight forward, fast-paced story will be disappointed. At times the book does slow down a bit, but I do enjoy history and genealogy so was able to tolerate the diversions without problem.

One other point. I have been thinking about the story and conclusion since I finished reading last night. I believe I will be thinking about it for a while. sometimes life does not provide easy endings.


An ecopy of this book was provided by the publisher in return for a review.

[Jim Coughenour · Rating 1 out of 5]

Read this book if you're up for a long, meandering, morose tale with lots of – and I mean copious – local color about the north shore of Lake Superior. If you're looking for a decent crime novel, keep looking. The story starts slowly, and then slows down. Then stops. The grisly crime at its core isn't solved. The mildly intriguing relationship between the blond victim and his blond buddy gets one twist that is never untied. In fact, about two-thirds of the way through the novel the crime, the investigation, and the characters are simply abandoned.

Meanwhile, the moody detective at the heavy heart of the book does no detecting; instead he mopes about, surmising stories that make him sad, thinking the same slow thoughts again and again until the final paragraph, until the reader is maddened with irresolution and burdened with a mass of genealogical minutiae that add up to exactly nothing.

Apparently this book is the first in a trilogy. If the next two are ever published, the only thing I'm looking forward to is a spoiler which will save me the trouble of reading another word.

[Maxine · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lance Hanson is a Law Enforcement Officer for a national park in northern Minnesota on the shore of Lake Superior. When he stumbles upon the naked and dead body of a Norwegian tourist, he is thrown. Once he reports the murder, he no longer needs to be involved but he can't let it go. This is especially true when he comes across information that could incriminate a relative. The knowledge is tearing him up because he knows what he should do but knows he can't even after a man he thinks is innocent is charged.

The Land of Dreams is as much a psychological study of how our pasts and our relationships effect us as it is a murder mystery. As such, the pace tends to be rather slow and the story frequently wanders off in other directions seemingly unrelated to the crime: Hanson's family genealogy, the history of the early fur trade in the area and the Voyageurs, the influx of people of Scandinavian descent, and even some interesting details of the small towns in the area like Grand Marais and the Grand Portage Reservation. Hanson spends a great deal of time trying to solve another murder which happened over a hundred years ago which may explain something about the new murder.

Personally, I found all of this as interesting as the mystery itself but I lived in Thunder Bay where the fur trade moved after Grand Portage was closed to the British at the beginning of the 19th c., I have been to Grand Marais and have eaten at Sven & Ole's and I really like history. However, I'm not sure how others who don't know the area and who don't care about history would feel about all of this. I suspect many will find it boring which is a real shame. One thing, though, also unrelated; if you ever want to see some of the most beautiful and underappreciated scenery in either Canada or the US, this is where it's at.

The Land of Dreams has won awards in Norway and deservedly so. It is, as I said a bit slow-paced but, if you are willing to take the time, you will find its somewhat meandering path to its ending well worth the effort. To borrow the words of the poet, it is a 'path less travelled'. It is not your usual mystery. It is intelligent with some keen observations of the human experience and psyche. The ending came as somewhat of a surprise as it seems to leave the story hanging. it may be that the real outcome is in another book (this is part of a trilogy) but even if it isn't, there's a certain rightness to this ending, sort of a Lady and the Tiger kind of thing which forces the reader to reexamine some of the question pondered throughout the book: questions of family versus justice and where our responsibility lies and do we have the right to make these kind of judgments anyway.

[christa · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a forest cop, Lance Hansen's job usually involves citing fisherman for a lack of license or similar easy-peasy no-big infraction. During a routine check on an illegal campsite Hansen finds a naked and bloody Norwegian tourist near Father Bargas’ Cross in Northern Minnesota. The man leads him to the also naked, brutally beaten body of another Norwegian tourist. The near-catatonic first naked man can only say one word: love. Except he says it in Norwegian.

Our hero is quickly shoved aside when the heavies come to town. The FBI and Norwegian dick Eirik Nyland her to solving the murder in Vidar Sondstol’s novel "Land of Dreams," the first book of his Minnesota Trilogy which is set along the shore of Lake Superior between Two Harbors and the Canadian border.

Lance Hansen is a loner, wife left and took the kid, who spends his time deep in the region’s historical archives. Upon discovering the dead body, one of his colleagues wonders aloud whether this was the first murder in Cook County history. The question sticks in Hansen’s craw, consuming him as the professionals investigate the present-day crime. He’s developing a theory that ties a fabled man who went missing eons ago to a relative who landed in Cook County under folk lore-like circumstances.

At the same time, Hansen is keeping a crucial deet from the big boys investigating the dead Norwegian.

Sundstol’s book, which won a crime-writing award in Norway, was published about five years ago. It’s just recently been translated and published by the University of Minnesota Press, largely because a bunch of Norway natives now living in MInnesota got ahold of the book by a fellow Norwegian set in their adopted home. A language class in MInneapolis has used the original to brush up on their Norwegian and a Norwegian guide company recently brought a busload of fans up here to tour the North Shore of Sundstol’s series.

Sundstol has a good eye -- and sense of recall -- for the Northern Minnesota landscape, which he describes in pinpoint detail in his book. In one scene, a character drives down Duluth’s Central Entrance, and it couldn’t be more clearly drawn if I sat in the parking lot of the Coppertop Church and wrote it myself. Samesies goes for the people and vistas further up the shoreline. It’s interesting to think that while we were going about our own business, unbeknownst to us all sorts of crime fans in Norway were reading about this place. And now that it has made the jump to Minnesota, it’s fun to see what he had to say about all of us and this place where we live.

Minnesota landscapes aside, this is not your conventional whodunnit. In fact, when someone is finally charged with the murder it has little impact. You see that this is less about a murder and more about Hansen’s inner seesaw struggle. Although eventually it probably will be more about the murder. Sondstal has two more books to slowly weave his way toward a conclusion.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

(nb: I received an advance review copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley)

“The Land of Dreams” is a gem, a taut mystery with relaxed pacing and access to the very depths of its characters’ souls.

Lance Hansen is a Law Enforcement Officer with the U.S. Forest Service in Minnesota’s Superior National Forest. He’s the guy who will fine you for fishing without a license, bust you for camping outside the designated areas, or hunting illegally. Mostly, it’s a quiet job, perfectly suited for Lance’s laid-back demeanor.

One summer day, Lance gets a call that somebody is camping in an unauthorized area next to Lake Superior. It’s his first call of the day. He drives his Jeep deep into the woods, then gets out to walk. He finds a brand new running shoe on the path. He picks up the shoe and continues walking. He comes to a giant granite cross, a historical monument, and Lance finds a young naked Norwegian man, covered in blood, wearing one brand new running shoe. They manage to get the shoe back on the man’s bare foot, and he bolts across the path into a thick patch of trees. In a clearing, Lance finds the grisliest murder scene he’s ever encountered.

And thus begins “The Land of Dreams.” Lance makes the discovery, but the case is quickly taken over by the FBI. Because the survivor and the decedent are both from Norway, the FBI brings in a noted Norwegian homicide detective to assist with the case. Lance is tasked with picking-up the detective at the Duluth airport.

Eirik Nyland is one of Norway’s most revered detectives. He has a quick mind, and reads people in a trice. He gets a good feeling about Lance Hansen, and the two become friends, discussing the case, despite Hansen being removed from the investigation.

Hansen is also the de facto town historian. As the FBI’s murder investigation continues, Lance begins to notice similarities with a hundred-plus-year-old missing persons case. Worse still, his unofficial detective work finds evidence that contradicts the FBI’s findings, evidence that could devastate the town as well as his own family.

“The Land of Dreams” is beautifully written. The descriptions of the ancient forests, rivers, and Lake Superior itself transported me to this small town: the sites, the smells, the giddy danger of a summer thunderstorm.

What I especially liked was the pacing in “The Land of Dreams.” So many mysteries race through their stories, only giving the reader pro forma portraits of the characters and the action. In “The Land of Dreams,” we also get a sense of the area’s history, the generally placid relationships between the mostly Norwegian-American community and the native Ojibway Native Americans, and the close-knit nature of a small town and its people. The narrative matches the more relaxed small town pace.

This novel invites comparison to some of John Sandford’s Minnesota-based thrillers—his character, Virgil Flowers, always seems to end up embroiled in small town intrigue—as well as Stieg Larsson’s “Millennium Trilogy.” I mention the Larsson work for two reasons. First, the pacing is similar: patient and rich in detail. Second, of course, is the Scandinavian connection. Larsson’s trilogy was originally written in Swedish; Sundstrøl writes in Norwegian.

When a novel is written in a foreign language, the reader is largely at the translator’s mercy. With “The Land of Dreams,” Tiina Nunnally does a splendid job taking Sundstrøl’s writing, and translating it into natural, descriptive English. Where “The Millennium Trilogy” sometimes felt stark and dry (though grammatically correct), Nunnally shows a wonderful command of colloquial English. “The Land of Dreams” is as smooth a read as if it were originally written by a skilled, insightful English-language author. Her work is commendable.

“The Land of Dreams” is book one of what Vidar Sundstrøl calls “The Minnesota Trilogy.” He and his wife spent time living along Lake Superior’s northern shore, and he found it to be the perfect location for a mystery.
Based on “The Land of Dreams,” I think Sundstrøl nailed it.

My only complaint is that I have to wait till Fall 2014 to read book two.

“The Land of Dreams” isn’t like what I call the “supermarket thrillers,” those superstar novels crammed onto a display rack alongside razor blades and denture adhesive. It’s one to savor and enjoy, like a good cognac—something real and warm in a generic light beer world.

Most Highly Recommended.

[Peggy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This turned out to be a very interesting book. It is told from the point of view of two men. The first, Lance Hansen, works in law enforcement for the federal lands in northern Minnesota. The second, Eirick Nyland, is a Norwegian police officer, called in to the sleepy north shore of Lake Superior to help out with a murder investigation. Two Norwegian tourists have been brutally attacked and one of them loses his life. Though the book is told in a rather plodding, procedural way, the author, Vidar Sundstol, effectively conveys the beauty of the lakeshore and how Norway and Sweden are kept alive in the minds of residents there. Much of the action takes place in and around Highway 61, memorialized by Bob Dylan as a place from which there is no return. Sundstol manages to carry out that theme by showing us the highway through the mind of a police officer, where killing storms rise up suddenly, mysterious figures appear on the side of the road, and a familiar vehicle can haunt a man for weeks.

Hansen is a local historian and somehow manages to oversee the Cook County historical collection and keep it in his home, due to lack of interest by others. He is especially interested in ferreting out historical truth, much to the annoyance of the locals, who prefer to cling to the good stories handed down by their ancestors. This is also the way he thinks about the murder and watching him remember and fit facts together into a coherent, plausible story is one of the joys of reading this book. The other is watching the emotionally frozen Hansen, move outside of the routines he built up after his divorce as he seeks to understand the truth of both the past and the present.

The Land of Dreams is the first book in a trilogy translated from the Norwegian and published by the University of Minnesota press. I can't wait for the next installment to come and I look forward to Lance Hansen's continuing development as a human and as a character. I am also curious to see what role Eirick Nyland has in the next two volumes.

[Stephanie · Rating 1 out of 5]

The book had an exciting premise (moody Minnesota! jokes about Norwegian Americans made by Norwegians!). It entertained the possibility of a smooth historical tie-in (Ojibwe stories! desperate pioneers!). It was supposed to be gripping, noirish, and moody.

It was none of those things. The historical tie-in was neither smooth nor particularly tied in. In fact, the only thing tied to the plot was leaden prose that should have sunk the whole thing into the soggy center of Lake Superior. The whole manuscript should then have been encased in the ice from that redundant dream that Lance Hansen kept thinking about because he could never have any dreams anymore ever, boo bloody hoo, so sad too damn bad, and then left there for the deep sea monsters to gnaw on. The book's slowness might have been justified had there been any psychological or philosophical insight, but it appears that all of the narrating characters have exactly one dimension, with a token divorce, affair, or distaste for glass Viking ships thrown in for "interest."

If you're going to read In the Land of Dreams, read it on a camping trip, so that you can use it to start your fire.

[Bettie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Bettie's Books

[Rachel Kahler · Rating 2 out of 5]

Perhaps it's cultural preference, but I found this book very hard to finish. "The Land of Dreams" is about a Minnesota man, Lance Hansen, who stumbles across a murder during his routine job as a "forest cop." The victim, a young Norwegian, has been camping in northern Minnesota with his best friend as a last boys' trip prior to his marriage back in Norway. As part of the investigation, a Norwegian detective arrives in the small town area to help out. The reader is lead (kind of) through the investigation of the young man's death to the conclusion.

First, the positives--This book was very, VERY obviously written by someone who has visited Minnesota. Either they've visited many times, or took meticulous notes. The places, the people, and the events are all very believable.

The negatives--I expected a mystery. There was very little of that here. Instead, the reader is mostly directed to an incredibly conflicted Lance, who, despite having found the body of the young man and his companion, has little to do with the investigation at all. In fact, the reader only occasionally gets updates on the investigation, which takes weeks and lots of...well...nothing that we know anything about because we're not part of the investigation.

In the meanwhile, we learn all about Lance's very average, divorced life. His time spent with his mother. His awkward time with his son. His ex wife and his first love. We learn about his obsession with the local history and his ancestors. And finally, we learn about his suspicions of his brother, which lead him to pathetically screw up his own self-worth.

I was sorely disappointed in the end, but not willing to consider reading the rest of the trilogy in order to satisfy my curiosity. I guess that if the upcoming books landed on my Kindle for free, I'd consider it. But I don't think I'd willingly pay for the pleasure.

[Birgit Alsinger · Rating 5 out of 5]

I don't think I have ever given ac crime novel 5 stars before, but this was absolutely brilliant, it had everything, a good story, believable characters, themes repeating themselves througout time, all kinds of moral and psychological dilemmas. The settings were easily visualised, I loved the stories about the American Indians and the Norweigan settlers, it made me want to go there. I warmly recommed this book and cant't wait to get my hands on the next one. I dare say we have some unfinished business..

By far the best crime novel this year for me, maybe even the best ever.

[Alicen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really wanted to like this book, the first in the "Minnesota Trilogy" by Norwegian author Vidar Sundstol, but it was written with such strange (and slow) pacing I couldn't get in to it. I did enjoy the Minnesota setting, and the author's attempts to capture the local north shore culture, but I ultimately the story did not keep my attention.

[Jo · Rating 2 out of 5]

World's most boring mystery, and a hell of a lot of the history of Minnesota. The main character was not distinct and so his emotional struggle was not at all interesting. The ending was unresolved and completely unsatisfying.

[Kerry Pickens · Rating 3 out of 5]

Vidar Sundstol is one of my favorite Scandinavian writers, and I would have given this book 4 stars but the last half just drug too much for me. There were also homophobic undertones to the main mystery, and it's just not very acceptable in today's times.

[Mal Warwick · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some 4.6 million Norwegian-Americans live in the United States, about half of them in the Upper Midwest. Nearly 900,000 can be found in Minnesota alone. These numbers compare with the total of 5.3 million people who live in Norway proper. Oslo, the capital, is home to only some 650,000 people—far fewer than the number of Norwegian-Americans who live in Minnesota. So, maybe it’s understandable that a novel awarded the title “best Norwegian crime novel” should be set in Minnesota. In fact, the state is the setting for three novels, the Minnesota Trilogy by Vidar Sundstøl. The Land of Dreams, the first, was described by Dagbladet, the country’s second largest tabloid newspaper, as one of the top twenty-five Norwegian crime novels of all time. Imagine that!

The Land of Dreams introduces us to Lance Hansen, his family, coworkers, and neighbors in a small town on the shore of Lake Superior in northeastern Minnesota. Hansen thinks of himself as a “forest cop.” He’s a 46-year-old police officer whose beat is the sprawling Superior National Forest near which he lives. Hansen lives in the town of Tofte, which was “one of those places where people called to tell you to get better before you even knew you were under the weather.” Though he’s divorced from an Ojibwe woman who now lives on a nearby Indian reservation and is the father of their active seven-year-old son, his life is generally uneventful.

Then Hansen stumbles across the badly beaten body of a young Norwegian man in the forest. The FBI has jurisdiction, assisted by a Norwegian homicide detective flown in to assist them. Hansen himself is not officially involved in the investigation, but his curiosity moves him to press his friends in law enforcement for details and to look into the circumstances of the murder himself. To his horror, he discovers that his younger brother, Andy, must be considered a suspect. Out of love for his brother and fear that he might actually be guilty, Hansen conceals from the FBI the evidence of Andy’s possible guilt that only he knows about. Meanwhile, to discover whether the young man’s murder was the first ever to take place in the region, he digs deeply into the historical archives he maintains—and discovers that a distant relative may have been murdered locally more than a century earlier. Hansen suspects a connection of some sort between the two killings.

The action in The Land of Dreams advances at a slow pace. There is suspense, but it’s muted. The book is a murder mystery, but it’s better thought of as literature. Sundstøl dwells at length on the history of Norwegian immigration to the area and on his protagonist’s troubled inner dialogue. The translation by Tiina Nunnally is artful, easing the reader’s path along the way despite the slowly unfolding action.

About the author

Vidar Sundstøl wrote the Minnesota Trilogy “after he and his wife lived for two years on the shore of Lake Superior,” according to the note about the author at the back of the book. An interview in the blog Scandinavian Crime Fiction in English Translation explains the background and the circumstances to Sundstøl’s stay in the U.S. (For starters, he met and married an American woman.) He is the author of six novels to date.

[Leah · Rating 2 out of 5]

Bogged down in unnecessary detail…

When a young Norwegian man is brutally murdered on the shores of Lake Superior, his body is discovered by Lance Hansen, a US Forest Service cop. As the investigation gets underway, suspicion quickly falls on the victim’s friend and companion. Lance is on the sidelines of the investigation, but realises he saw something that night that casts a different light over what may have happened. Will he put his family at risk by telling what he suspects?

The first chapter or two of this novel are very effective – Lance’s discovery of the body is dramatic and chilling. However, we are very soon bogged down in a mass of local and family history, as Lance, an amateur genealogist, begins to wonder if this is the first murder committed in the area. There is an attempt to draw parallels between the current crime and an event over a century ago, when Norwegians were beginning to populate this area of Minnesota. This drags the whole book down to a crawl, as we are given endless and repetitive stories about the early days of the settlers and details of the family history of almost every character, while there is very little actual investigation of the murder. Suffice it to say that, since the investigators soon find DNA at the scene, it ought to have been possible to wrap the whole thing up fairly quickly, but for reasons unbeknownst to this reader (who suspects that the writer got himself bogged down in an inconsistency that he hoped the reader wouldn’t spot) the police don’t seem to bother to try to match the DNA to that of their suspects.

Between the never-ending Minnesotan history, the in-depth look at the minutiae of daily life, including what everyone eats and where they eat it, and Lance’s constant agonising over whether he should put family loyalty over duty, I found this a real slog (though I could possibly set myself up in business as a tour guide of the region now). It is well enough written in a technical sense and the translation by Tiina Nunally is seamless, but I’m afraid it is simply dull. And worse yet – it’s the first of a trilogy so the crime is left unresolved at the end. I’m afraid I care so little about the outcome, I will not be reading the other two books. I find it frankly amazing that this book won an award for best Norwegian crime novel of the year in 2008 – I can only assume it was a bad year…

NB This book was provided for review by the publisher.

www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com

[Pamela · Rating 5 out of 5]

Superior dreams

A mystery reveals many mysteries for Lance Hansen, a National Forest Service policeman. He is a person of unusual perception who unravels family history as he connects with those who are investigating the violent murder of a young Norwegian man camped near the North Shore of Lake Superior, in Minnesota. Along the way, Eirik Nyland, a Norwegian detective sent to assist the FBI in solving this crime, seeks Lance's acquaintance.

Lance has a deep sense of place. In addition, he and most others who live in his region are the descendants of Scandinavian immigrants, mostly miners and fishermen, who came to this region to find their fortune. Many family stories are generated in this environment, which Lance knows well, because he also is the Cook County historian. But Lance's family stories do not reveal what he finds out about himself, about his family's Indian blood, and how this affects the solution of this mystery.

What drives Lance, with respect the murder, is his historian's desire to have stories validated; proven true. Lance is also deeply troubled by the knowledge he carries about the murderer. Knowledge he will not share with anyone else. In addition, he is drawn to solving a much older mystery involving an Ojibwe (Annishaanabe) Medicine Man, who is connected to the people on the nearby reservation of Grand Portage.The Spirit of the Annishaanabe are calling to him.

Vidar Sundstøl, the author, has written in a way that creates the place and the people of this mostly rural area, and documents its history in a depth not often seen in a police procedural. In addition, he may pique the interest of Scandinavian readers about their immigrant relatives, and American readers about the history and culture of this area of the North shore of 'Lac Supérieur', as the French trappers would say. This is the first of a trilogy. I eagerly await the translation of the last two books in the series.

[Linda · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was VASTLY disappointed in this book. The paper had a good review, the book received the Best Norwegian Crime Novel award, it has a unique approach - a Norwegian writing about an American Forest Service cop.

But I found the writing uninspiring, the characters shaky - at one time verging on 3-D, on another slipping into almost stock characters - and the plot thin. The Forest Service cop reaches the end of the novel with a secret and since this is the first book in the Minnesota Trilogy, I'm sure that secret will be carried on. The writing also wasn't "sophisticated" at all. I don't mean that is necessarily a bad thing but in this case it is. (Admission: I like Faulkner MUCH better than Hemingway, but that's not to say Hemingway's writing isn't sophisticated.) It just seemed too simple for the heavy ideas the writer was trying to make it carry.

Try it if you like. I know there are people who will love it.

But I didn't.

[judy · Rating 1 out of 5]

Without a doubt this is the worst book I've ever read. Clearly I don't have Norwegian sensitivity because I was bored out of my skull. I would have closed it early on but I wanted to read about Duluth, Two Harbors and the North Shore of Lake Superior for personal reasons. To top it off, I loathed the central character. Flawed would be a complement. He doesn't seem to able to bounce back from anything. Even "wuss" imparts too much dignity. I almost never give just one star and I rarely shred any author. I've made an exception for this man because he is evidently a star in Norway. He can take it. Others can read at their own risk but it would be really be helpful if they have some emotional connection to Scandinavia.

[Neil MacNeill · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was a very disappointing book that I almost put down several times. I kept thinking that the slow pace was going to pick up and the annoying main character was going to go through some sort of metamorphosis. The writing/translation was a bit awkward or maybe simplistic in places, but I could forgive that if the plot moved along. Worse yet, it ended in an obvious ploy for a sequel. Maybe this doesn't even deserve 2 stars.

[Signe · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this slow moving mystery set at the North Shore, Minnesota, USA. Apparently Sundstøl lived for several years in the area, so his descriptions of the areas and cultural insights really help make this novel.

This isn't standard mystery fare. Apparently these novels are popular in Norway, and will likely appeal more to people with a specific interest in the modern Norwegian diaspora. The themes that interest me include genealogy and history, specifically of Ojibwe history on the land, the fur trade, and Scandinavian immigration. Sundstøl does a remarkable job of intertwining a profound understanding of period and local history and current culture into his tale. He was not a casual tourist.

Other enjoyable aspects were seeing this area through the eyes of a Norwegian Homicide Detective who arrives to support the FBI investigation into the murder of a young Norwegian man. The character has interesting sensitivity to subtle impressions of places and people. The cultural exchange between a Norwegian and Norwegian Americans is fun, but doesn't devolve into mockery of Americans as provincial and naive as we can be at times.

The main character, Forest Service police officer Lance Hansen, is well developed and likable. His interest in genealogy and local history preservation lead him to learn that his background and identity aren't the carefully staid Norwegian life his family laid out for him. For one, he learns his great grandmother, reportedly "French Canadian" and the only non-Norwegian in his family tree, was actually French Indian. It was not uncommon for people to pass as white if they could, especially after attending the compulsory and cruelly harsh Indian boarding schools.

Overall, when Sundstøl develops a character he gives a great deal of insight of their inner workings and processes.

There is one character inconsistency that made me wonder what the author is up to. Lance has his great grandmother's journal in hand for years and never tried to read it because she wrote in French. Maybe some people would ignore the journal, possibly throw it out, but Lance has a greater than normal interest in family history. Was this a subtle dig at American provincialism? If so, he's forgiven!

Fun book.

The translation is by Tiina Nunnally, who is amazing.

This novel is part I of a trilogy, therefore the end is left open.

[R.G. Ziemer · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the books I brought home as a souvenir of our trip around Lake Superior last month was Land of Dreams by Vidar Sundstøl. I’d noticed a few gift shops on the North Shore selling copies of the author’s Minnesota Trilogy. When I found an autographed copy of the first volume for five bucks at the Birchbark Bookstore in Grand Marais, I snapped it up. You never know how good a local color novel might be, but this time I wasn’t disappointed.

Lance Hansen is the unhappy forest service cop who discovers the bashed-in body of a Norwegian tourist. He finds himself involved in the murder investigation along with local police, the FBI and a detective from Norway. Although the authorities seek a quick and easy solution to the crime, for Hansen it is more complicated. He becomes obsessed with a connection between this recent killing and the death of an Ojibwe medicine man a hundred and twenty years earlier. Hansen, an amateur historian, is a descendent of Norwegian immigrants with deep roots in the area. He fears that the truth may involve or affect his own family: distant ancestors from the early years of settlement as well as Hansen’s own half-Indian son.

The book seems much more literary than I expected of the murder-mystery genre. In his two- year sojourn on Lake Superior’s North Shore, Sundstøl absorbed much of the essential look and mood of the place. The result is much beautiful description of the lake, the forest, and the small towns – some thriving, some languishing. The author also reveals a deep feeling for the people and their lives. I believe much credit for the language must also go to the translator, Tiina Nunnally, since Sundstøl wrote the book in Norwegian. Nunnally is an award-winning translator with much experience, including a translation of Sigrid Undset’s Kristin Lavransdatter.

As a souvenir of the North Shore, and an enhancement of my visit, Land of Dreams has been a delight. In addition to the suspense of the murder mystery, Sundstøl traces the story across a true-to-life map of the region from Duluth to Grand Portage. His Norwegian detective breakfasts in Grand Marais where I did at the South of the Border Restaurant, and dines at the popular Gun Flint Tavern. Lance Hansen picks his son up on the street behind the high school in the Ojibwe community I drove through at Grand Portage. A brief, violent storm forces the policeman from the road near Two Harbors. The crime scene itself is near the well-known shrine of Baraga’s Cross. And throughout the book, the author treats the history of the area and its people with interest and sensitivity. I hope the books are being read by the locals folks, because they and their home are really the main features of The Land of Dreams.

[Deb · Rating 5 out of 5]

I live in Duluth, so a mystery set on the North Shore of Minnesota (on Lake Superior), with locations and people spanning from Duluth to Grand Portage on the border with Canada, would already be of interest. Add to this that the book was written in Norwegian, by a Norwegian crime novelist who lived in the area for two years, that it involves the heritage of locals of Ojibwe and Scandinavian descent, that it includes a lot of well-researched history and cultural background, and well-written and compelling characters. Once I was a chapter in I couldn't stop. I cared about the characters and I loved seeing this fascinating region through the eyes of a Norwegian author who combines a certain affectionate familiarity with an observant outsider's perspective. I recommend this book to anyone, but people interested in history, people who have been to or are thinking of going to the North Shore, and, of course, lovers of crime fiction, should be especially interested.
This is the first in the author's "Minnesota Trilogy", and I'm going to the library to check out the second immediately after work.

[Becky Loader · Rating 3 out of 5]

Translated from the original Norwegian, the text gets choppy in places, but I was intrigued by the setting in northern Minnesota. The author obviously knows the area and can sling names and places with true precision.

I loved the Norwegian detective who comes from "the old country" because the man murdered is a Norwegian tourist. The main character, a forest cop--employed by the National Forestry Service as a policeman--, got on my nerves after a while. The puzzle? Pretty good, but nothing is resolved in the first volume of the trilogy. You have to read the second two.

[Monica · Rating 2 out of 5]

The sense of place is wonderful - the descriptions of nature, towns and their people, topography, climate and weather, all really well done. The history of the interactions between the Norwegians and the native people was all vey interesting. If that had been the book, I would have said four stars for sure. But then you have poor repressed, depressed, obsessed Lance, the unfortunate woods cop, hoarder of history, and his endless angst. Which just goes on, and on, and goes nowhere. Positively soporific.

[Deb · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you love to read about Minnesota, especially if you live there like I do, this murder mystery is for you, love the book and kept me up for hours trying to finish. There is a lot of history in this book, along with it being a real page turner. Highly recommend. Also there are two sequels to this book I will be reading.

[Trudy Ackerblade · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book. It was more of a study in characters than the usual mytery. It left me with more questions than answers. I guess I have 2 more books to add to my "want to read" list.

[Nate Ehrlich · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good murder mystery with A LOT of North Shore historical context, some of which is overdone and some of with us really engaging. Good on its own but definitely need to keep reading the following books to get some larger sense of a conclusion.

[Kathy · Rating 3 out of 5]

All the references in this book, made reading it like a guided tour of the north shore of Minnesota. After finishing the book, I was disappointed to still not learn who killed the Norwegian.

[fleegan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Scandi crime that takes place in Minnesota? Could this be as good as regular Scandi crime, with its use of landscape, tight mysteries involving history, and a slight hint of the supernatural?

Yes! Oh my gosh, yes!

This book was first released in Norway in 2008 and won the Riverton Prize for Best Norwegian Crime Fiction. So really, you don’t need me to tell you that this book is top-notch. But you guys? This book is top-notch.

This is the first in a trilogy set in a small Minnesota town on Lake Superior. Lance Hansen is a U.S. forest officer and local historian who finds a dead Norwegian tourist. Eirik Nyland is a detective from Norway sent to investigate along with the local authorities.

Sundstol makes wonderful use of the landscape as well as the history of the area, including the Native American history. While Nyland is working on the recent murder investigation, Hansen, who found the body, is not involved in the investigation, but being the local historian he starts looking into a similar crime that happened 100 years earlier in the same area. The mix of the early Norwegian settlers and the native Ojibwe tribal history is excellent (as far as accuracy, I’ve no idea, but it made for good reading.). I thought mixing the two might be too confusing, or rather, I’d have to remember too many things, but no, the storytelling is great.

This isn’t exactly a typical police procedural either. The murder investigation is peripheral to the real story, which, I’m not exactly clear what that is. This is not to say that it’s confusing, it’s just incomplete. This is the first book in a trilogy and while there is an ending to the first book, you can tell that it’s setting up the second book. Usually I’d feel cheated, but the author is telling a story is so massive, and so well-paced, that I can’t wait for the second book. This book isn’t a thriller nor action packed, so I could see how some people might lose their patience reading it. But it really is a great piece of storytelling, and I enjoyed the relaxed pace.