As Dylan Thomas once wrote, “To begin at the beginning…” In 2010, Ragnar Jónasson published his debut novel Snjóblinda in his native Iceland – in 2015, the English-language Snowblind was published. The story of young police officer Ari Thór Arason became the first of six books in the Dark Iceland series. Before all that, though, back in 2009 in Iceland Jónasson published the first instalment of Ari Thór’s story, but until now that ‘prequel’ has been missing in the English canon – an omission rectified by the inclusion of Fadeout in a double-header, tenth-anniversary edition of Snowblind.
Fadeout begins two years prior to the events of Snowblind, but, like many instalments in this epic tale, it flicks back and forth across multiple time periods. Here we first meet Ari as a student, not yet a police officer. His mind, though, is already jumping ahead, intent on uncovering the truth about his father’s sudden disappearance nine years earlier.
Seemingly with everything going for him and not a trouble in the world, Ari senior vanishes without a trace, leaving a 13-year-old son and a distraught wife at a loss. Fast forward to 2006: when Ari junior receives a credit-card bill for £7,000, run up in his name in London, he spots that the date of birth belongs to his missing father, not himself. Could his father still be alive in London?
Ari begins a journey that takes him not only to London but also into uncomfortable family truths. Was his father the successful businessman he seemed? Did his mother know more than she revealed before her sudden death in a car accident? Were his parents’ lives as harmonious as they appeared, or did the mention of a mysterious Silvia in his father’s diary suggest a more unfaithful past?
Yet to embark on a police career, Ari is unburdened by protocol, and Jónasson makes full use of this dramatic freedom. Ari bends the truth, plants ideas in witnesses’ minds, and extracts information they would never have shared with the authorities. It’s a fascinating concept, setting up our central protagonist for the career we know lies ahead but who is, at this stage, unencumbered by responsibility. Part investigation, part coming-of-age story, we follow Ari as he uncovers what really happened to his father and, in doing so, discovers himself.
There is no ‘crime’ in Fadeout, no murder to be solved, and yet it remains as taut and thrilling as any traditional Nordic police procedural. The requisite plot twists are there, and, as we have come to expect from Jónasson, there is more than a hint of Agatha Christie in the big reveal that neatly ties the disparate plot threads together. Jónasson has also developed his own modus operandi – playing with timelines and specialising in multi-decade plotlines. I
It’s a device that works well here; the flow between 2006 and 1987 seamlessly managed.
For readers of the six previously published Dark Iceland books, there is a richness of detail here that adds depth to Ari’s character and sheds light on what drove him to abandon his studies to become a police officer.
For newcomers, Fadeout provides the perfect entry point into a journey that will take them into the darkest corners of Icelandic society – and an ideal launchpad into Snowblind.
Returning to Snowblind a decade after first reading it, but now prefaced with Fadeout, offers something fresh. Where first time around we met Ari making the life-changing move from Reykjavík to Siglufjörður in northern Iceland, a move that felt radical, now after Fadeout we understand more about the forces behind this untypical Nordic police officer.
Two years on from Fadeout and the revelations of his father’s past, Ari has abandoned his theological studies and is forging a career in the police – though his colleagues still mockingly refer to him as “Reverend Ari.”
Snowblind takes us into more conventional Nordic noir territory: Ari isolated in a small community cut off from the rest of Iceland by blizzards and avalanches. With no way in or out, you’d think a would-be killer might think twice. But soon after the still-wet-behind-the-ears officer arrives, the body count rises, and it falls to the newcomer to solve the case without support from the capital.
Again, Christie’s influence is clear; the snow-cut-off town akin to a locked-room mystery where the killer must be among the tightly knit community.
With Fadeout behind us, Ari’s character and decisions make greater sense. What once seemed cavalier now feels grounded in backstory, creating a more rounded – if still complex – protagonist.
A decade on, Snowblind still thrills: Jónasson sets out his stall for the series and paints a world where landscape and community are as vital as the human characters themselves.
Fadeout by Ragnar Jónasson, translated by Larissa Kyzer, and Snowblind by Ragnar Jónasson, translated by Quentin Bates, are published in a joint tenth-anniversary edition by Orenda Books on 10 October 2025.
