Detective Konrad, a retired police officer, faces another sticky cold case. Every witness is either deceased or lying when he starts to investigate. He should have started sooner. THE QUIET MOTHER is a lady named Valborg, who read in the papers that Konrad solved a decades-old murder when a body reappeared in a glacier. She asked him to help find her long-lost child. Now, Valborg is dead.  

With occasional switches to the early 1970s, we get to contrast Iceland and Reykjavík as it started to modernise, with today’s post-economic collapse city. In both time frames, we see violence against women, including sexual assault and controlling domestic abuse, made worse fifty years ago, as everywhere, by strict religious outlooks and few work options for women and girls. Konrad, who saw this happen in his family, tries to make amends. He also seeks personal redemption for refusing to try to find Valborg’s child. The quiet lady was killed by an intruder in her apartment. The modern contrast with Marta, the dynamic female police inspector, could not be stronger. She pulls the story together for us.  

How do you go about finding a child given up for adoption fifty years earlier, when you don’t know if it’s male or female, or who the father is? Well, here’s the thing. Iceland is small in population size, and those from the city tend not to leave for rural isolation. So, everyone knows someone who knows someone you’re looking for, and what you need. In this way, the investigation reminds me of the Inspector Brunetti series set in Venice. Except, it’s Christmas, which means the day never gets bright, and place names like Langjökull, Hafnarfjörður, and Þingholt abound for gorgeous colour. That last, I Googled to find the first letter is pronounced Th.  

The second thread, which runs through THE QUIET MOTHER, continues the work of Konrad and his female friend Eygló, a psychic, finding out about their delinquent, conniving fathers. The two men worked together to con women out of money with fake seances. Konrad's investigation into his father's murder in 1963 sees him searching through a press photographer’s life work of negatives and prints. This is a pointed reminder that the arts in preservation of daily life are not getting funded compared to museum pieces. As I continue through the Detective Konrad series, I am definitely over the psychic experience part, and I care less with every book who killed Konrad senior. I have been reading Icelandic author Arnaldur Indriðason for over a decade, and these chilling translations show an insight into a community I would not otherwise see.