“Nedrejord’s new novel gives voice to a rape victim’s fear, anger and need to make sense of her experience … There are few such direct descriptions of rape and the traumas it creates. The defense of brutal implacability is articulated with wisdom and the certainty that although the victim’s perspective must be decisive, it cannot be the only perspective. In a spring which has been rather tame in literary terms, Nedrejord has written one of the year’s best novels so far”
Carina Elisabeth Bedddari, Morgenbladet
“Kathrine Nedrejord’s new novel speaks on behalf of all rape victims in a time when we have finally accepted that rape has lifelong consequences … The first-person narrator shows how strongly the violent crime impacts on the victim. The stated aim of the text is to understand the criminal, but this fails completely. She never gets past and beyond her own emotions … This failure is in reality the book’s greatest strength. The novel shows that the person writing both carries the trauma with her and is imprisoned by it. It becomes impossible to get close enough to the perpetrator for her to take his perspective … Instead, this has become a furious monologue about the rape … the novel [comes across as] a self-aware salvo that emphatically places the power of definition with the victim.”
Astrid Fosvold, Vårt Land
“… delves deep into the attitudes we have towards victim and perpetrator in this new novel about the long-term trauma of rape … an admirable accomplishment”
Inger Bentzrud, Dagbladet, 5/6 stars
“Nedrejord has written a powerful, solid novel about the inner split that results from a life-changing trauma … Some lines contain so much pain that the reader is quite simply knocked over … And the frame is obvious: Katrine waits for the trial that will end with a sentence for the man who assaulted her. As readers we wait anxiously with her”
Thula Kopreitan, NRK
“By twisting a Dostoyevsky title and calling her fourth novel ‘Criminal and Punishment’, Kathrine Nedrejord immediately signals that she is on a deeply moral mission … The final sentence of the novel is not only thoughtful. It catches the reader completely off-guard”
Steinar Sivertsen, Stavanger Aftenblad, 5/6 stars
“Nedrejord’s inner conflict and polemical pen has led to a self-contradictory, fascinating work”
Kenneth Moe, Aftenposten
