Best for:
Those looking for a claustrophobic mystery told from many perspectives.

In a nutshell:
College friends Helena, Gunnlauger, Ármann, and Daníel are getting together for a weekend of shooting birds and catching up. But it is winter in Iceland, so really anything can happen.

Worth quoting:
N/A (Jónasson is an excellent author but I don’t often find myself underlining phrases in his books.)

Why I chose it:
I’ve read nearly all of his other books and loved them. I had no idea this one existed!

Review:
I do enjoy a mystery told from multiple perspectives, and I especially enjoy it when none of the characters seem fully innocent.

That is the case with this book. There is Daníel, the struggling actor who has chosen to live in England instead of Iceland, and hasn’t been home in a couple of years. There is Helena, the only woman in the group, who is grieving the death of her partner five years ago. There is Ármann, who runs a successful tourism company. And there is Gunnlauger, who is really only there because he’s a childhood friend of Daníel, and he’s a bit of creep.

The weekend starts out fine, with the group drinking at their comfortable hunting lodge. But the following day, while the four of them are out on a bird hunt, an unexpected storm hits, causing them to try to seek shelter in a respite hut. They find the hut, and are faced with an utter shock.

From there, there are some choices made, and some secrets come to light. It had unexpected twists (as his novels often do) and literally made it challenging for me to put down. I started it before bed on Friday night, then picked it up after I did some chores on Saturday morning, reading straight through to the end (including while eating lunch). I love that feeling, of wanting to get through the page I’m reading so I can see what’s happening on the next one, and once again, Jónasson has done that for me.

What’s next for this book:
Donate - hopefully the next reader will enjoy it as much as I did. ( )

Un excellent exercice de style! très rythmé, très riche. ( )

Ragnar Jonasson is becoming one of my favorite mystery/thriller writers ever since I read The Girl Who Died. This second book of Outside that I read by Ragnar Jonasson was just as great as The Girl Who Died.
This was an intense and suspense-filled story. The weather, location, and landscape played a big part in this one. Also, having a blanket on hand while reading this would be something I'd recommend since I got cold while reading this one.
This was about 4 friends who get together and go hunting birds in the freezing wild in Iceland. The weather is one of their enemies or obstacles in the story here as when the blizzard starts; it causes them to have to find shelter and then they end up in a hut. As things happen while they're in the hut and waiting the storm out and trying to figure things out, then other things surface, like all the problems in the characters and dynamics of their relationships among their group. They find themselves in another dangerous and threatening situation as they're all stuck together in the frozen wilderness with all their buried issues, with each other coming to the surface. The ending has a twist/reveal I didn't see coming and it kept me on the edge of my seat. I couldn't put it down and I read it all in one sitting.
If you like Ragnar Jonasson, Scandinavian Noir, Mystery/Thrillers, and intense reads that keep you turning the page until the end, then check this one out.
Thanks so much to St. Martin's Press/Minotaur Books and NetGalley for letting me read and review this fantastic book. All thoughts and opinions are my own. ( )

Just as with his other standalone novel (The Girl Who Died), Jónasson steps away from the style of his series books and goes for a new type of a crime story. Had I started reading it expecting something familiar, I'd probably never finished it - the switch of narrators and the piecemeal information we get about the story is designed to be unsettling - and it works.

Four friends go on a hike in the wilderness of Iceland and end up stranded by a storm, with a stranger with a gun sitting in the corner of the only place they can find shelter. The novel starts in the middle of the story and backtracks to show us how they ended up in this situation and through the novel we get glimpses to the past - a past that holds the key to understanding what is happening during that cold and dark night. The short chapters alternate the narrators, progressing the story gradually - we almost never see the same part of the story of that night from two different narrators - the story progresses as if there was a single one and the reader is left to fill in some of the details when we get back to the same narrator.

And then comes the end (after some deaths of course). Jónasson has a habit of ending his novels weirdly and that works in a series but here it feels almost incomplete. We get the whole story of what happened before and during this night so the novel is finished in that regard but when it ends, you feel like there should be more - the consequences for the ones who survive the night are left to one's imagination.

It is an interesting approach to telling the story but it felt a bit gimmicky in places - like an exercise in style more than an attempt to build a novel. The plot and the tension through it saves it a bit but it is probably the weakest of Jónasson's novels translated into English.

The edition I read ended with a short story: after the excerpt which follows the novel so some people, having been annoyed at the end of the novel, may have even missed it. I almost did - as I rarely if ever read excerpts, I sometimes just close the book when I reach them. The story is very short and has two people sitting for a dinner and discussing the past. It is about forgiveness and finding a way to live with the past - and that ties it to the novel. It also manages to pull off a surprising ending - probably the only thing that makes it stand out.

Overall - if you had never read Jónasson, don't start here. If you had read anything else by him and you are ready to give a different style a chance, try this novel. It has its clever moments and it presents a nice puzzle to solve but still remains unsatisfactory. ( )

There is no accounting for what people will do.
“Outside” by Ragnar Jónasson sends readers into the cold, the isolation, and the danger of Iceland where even the brightest days might prove hazardous for those who do not show respect for conditions so close to the Arctic Circle. The drama begins on a mind-numbingly cold November night.
The story goes back in time with alternating narratives so readers learn how these friends got to this miserable, frightening, cold place. Readers get to know each person both individually and as part of the group; their backgrounds; their personalities; and their secrets. There is no stronger bond than a shared secret.
This is a reunion trip -- friends, food, and a foray on to the moors, a world away from the urban sprawl of Reykjavík. It is to be an adventure in nature’s merciless elements. Every detail has been carefully planned, perhaps too carefully.
The storm begins; no one is coming to rescue them, but they all believe that it will be fine in the end. They have no choice but to stop somewhere and wait it out. The refuge cabin should have provided a sanctuary, but it did not. Inside the emergency shelter, they found something unexpected and shocking.
“Outside” is filled jaw-dropping surprises. Questions hang in the frozen air. The letters? The gun? This stranger? Had they caused this? Had nothing happened by chance? Had it always been meant to end this way?
I received a review copy of “Outside” from Ragnar Jónasson, Victoria Cribb, translator, St. Martin's Press, and Minotaur Books. It is strangely creepy, exceedingly bizarre, and exceptionally compelling. The chain of events is complex and diverse, but the motive is simple and uncomplicated.
“Outside” by Ragnar Jónasson is now available in print, as an e-book, and on audio from independent bookstores, online booksellers, retail stores, public libraries and anywhere you get your books.
#BookReview #RagnarJónasson #Iceland ( )