Writing in Ice: A Crime Writer's Guide to Iceland

  TV and Film Iceland has become a favourite location for films and television series in the last few years. Here are some that I have enjoyed or found useful. Several of these are adaptations of the novels I have mentioned earlier. Trapped A TV detective series created by Iceland’s foremost director, Baltasar Kormákur. It is set in a village in the East Fjords, cut off by snow. A body is found, the weekly ferry from Denmark is suspected, and the burly local police chief Andri investigates. Very good. The Valhalla Murders A classic police detective TV series. A succession of murders are linked to a children’s home - Valhalla. Kata must solve the crimes, with the help of an enigmatic Icelandic expat just back from Oslo. Beautiful images of Reykjavík in the snow and really quite a lot of blood. Woman at War My favourite Icelandic film. A choir conductor named Halla is an eco-terrorist, destroying power lines supplying an aluminium plant, all the time watched by three musicians who provi

  If you want to understand Iceland you need to read the sagas. But which ones – there are loads of them? These are the ones I enjoyed the most. It is well worth paying for a good translation - here the Penguin Classics brand earns its reputation for reliability. Penguin publishes a 700-page compendium of about thirty of them, entitled The Sagas of the Icelanders . Njal’s Saga. The longest and best. A legal thriller. The hero is Njál, a canny lawyer who tries and fails to mediate between families bearing grudges. Egil’s Saga. Egil was a great warrior with a bad temper and a flair for poetry. The Laxdaela Saga. A love triangle between three inhabitants of Breidafjördur: Gudrun, Kjartan and Bolli. Much blood is shed. Gudrun is one of the most fascinating characters in the sagas: don't mess with her. Grettir’s Saga. Grettir is an outlaw with a bad temper who fights humans and the undead. Eyrbyggja Saga or The Saga of the People of Eyri. The quarrels of various families in Snaefellsnes