The Blue Place

Amazon.com
Science fiction writer Nicola Griffith, winner of the Nebula and Tiptree Awards, proves that good writing transcends genre. The Blue Place is a spare, cold suspense thriller--Norwegian noir--with the kind of strong, enigmatic characters that made Griffith's Slow River such a great read. Aud Torvingen is a former cop, martial artist, and Scandinavian to the core. She stalks powerfully through the streets of Atlanta and the fjords of Norway in search of an art thief and killer. At first, she frightens us a bit, because she insistently imagines how easy it would be to kill almost everyone she meets. Having descended more than once into that dark, cold psychic realm wherein violence provides primal pleasure, Aud is constantly wary of her fellow human beings. But our fear turns to fascination as she finds herself falling in love with Julia, a smart, beautiful art dealer mixed up in the crime, and getting closer to finding the center of the danger in the icy north.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

A police lieutenant with the elite "Red Dogs" until she retired at twenty-nine, Aud Torvingen is a rangy six-footer with eyes the color of cement and a tendency to hurt people who get in her way. Born in Norway into the failed marriage between a Scandinavian diplomat and an American businessman, she now makes Atlanta her home, luxuriating in the lush heat and brashness of the New South. On a humid April evening between storms, out walking just to stay sharp, she turns a corner and collides with a running woman. Catching the scent of clean, rain-soaked hair, Aud nods and silently tells the stranger Today, you are lucky, and moves on - when behind her a house explodes, incinerating its sole occupant, a renowned art historian. When Aud turns back, the woman is gone. But Julia Lyons-Bennet will return seeking Aud's help and protection from a deadly international game of forgery, drugs, money and murder.

FROM THE CRITICS

LA Times

Griffith has a fine way with character and a sure talent...Many passages are beautifully written; most seem to do double work, shimmering with the many levels and complex meanings of this remarkable novel.

San Francisco Chronicle

With her rich imagination, Griffith has created an intriguing world and a character who not only makes her way through it with boldness and creativity, but takes the time to reflect as she goes. Lore confronts moral dilemmas, faces the pain of her past, and eventually finds an identity centered in herself.

Phoenix Gazette

Dark and intensely involving...Griffith -- with language brilliant and clear as sun-glittered water -- delineates a woman's struggle to remain herself and stay alive.

Publishers Weekly

A double Lambda Literary Award winner and recipient of a Tiptree and the Nebula for her two SF novels (Ammonite and Slow River), Griffith switches genres and breathes life into an appealing heroine in this smoothly plotted pulse-slammer. Former undercover cop Aud Torvingen, a young Norwegian woman living in Atlanta, is an expert in self-defense and firearms, obsessed with the adrenaline-charged state she calls the "blue place." Only danger makes her feel alive; emotionally, she remains untouched. That changes during a late-night walk when she collides with multilayered trouble in the person of art broker Julia Lyons-Bennett, who happens to be running from the home of art appraiser Jim Lusk moments before a bomb levels it. Julia refuses to believe that she was the intended victim or that the bombing was drug-related, and she hires Aud to investigate. When the trail leads to a money-laundering, double-dealing banker, Aud believes Julia is out of danger but agrees to join her as translator and protector on a business trip to Norway. In Oslo, a resistant Aud gradually opens her heart to this blue-eyed beauty, and during their holiday trip to the fjords she realizes the depth of the passion that links them. But new love has a way of dulling the senses, and when Julia returns alone to Oslo for a day's business, Aud suddenly smells the danger they've been in all along and summons every bit of strength from her "blue place" to win a compelling race to save the woman she loves. Readers will want to see more of Aud Torvingen. Agent: Shawna McCarthy; editors: Jennifer Hershey and Charlotte Abbott. (July) FYI: Like her protagonist, Griffith is an expert in women's self-defense.

Library Journal

Aud Torvingen, the narrator of this stylish but ultimately hollow novel by the author of the award-winning Ammonite (Del Rey: Ballantine, 1993) is the daughter of a Norwegian diplomat and a British businessman. Living in the United States, and a former lieutenant on the Atlanta police force, she dabbles in the "personal protection" business. Aud is obsessed with the sensuality of violence; she fantasizes about the ease with which she can kill. One night, she sees a beautiful woman running down the street. Minutes later, a house nearby bursts into flames. The woman, Julia, draws Aud into a web of arson, forgery, and murder. The two become lovers, and the story culminates in a highly coincidental trip to Norway. All this would be more palatable if Aud weren't such a prig. After the third mention of her perfect body and ability to blend anywhere (a neat trick for a six-foot-tall Nordic blond), numbness sets in. And if Julia's love is so healing, why does Aud glory in a final bloody murder in her name? Not recommended. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 3/15/98.]Laurel Wilson, Mount Vernon, IN

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