Patrik Øksnes makes a living giving lectures to his brother Paal. While he is on a mission in Bergen, he checks in at Hotel 23 Rooms, the very same place Martin Romberg was found dead some time ago, a case which has been in Patrik’s mind ever since.
Martin Romberg worked at a company called Via Vaage Services, a company managed by women, where Romberg claims he was sexually harassed, and which he also thought was involved in financial crime. Even though the police never found anything suspicious around this death, Paal and Patrik discovers that they will look closer at the case, and the lead they follow takes them home to their rural hometown, and the feminist group Free Women, founded by no other than their very own spouses, Mina and Beatrine.
Romberg. Women and Crime is a wild, surprising novel that toys with the crime genre, but which also show Tormod Haugland’s distinctive form of local globalism.
“A crime spoof with a sting … Haugland has read Kafka and reaps remarkable rewards. The totally unexpected, even insane games he plays with the crime genre, and the fun he has doing so, causes gravity to make way for the highly comical. Since his debut in 1994 with the novel Under, Tormod Haugland has become a literary heavyweight. I won’t hesitate calling him a writers’ writer.”
5/6, Fædrelandsvennen
