Yrsa Sigurðardóttir

Vilborg Yrsa Sigurðardóttir (born August 24, 1963 ) is an Icelandic writer.

Yrsa Sigurðardóttir, 2019

Life

Yrsa Sigurðardóttir graduated from Menntaskólinn í Reykjavík grammar school in 1983 and then began studying civil engineering at Háskóli Íslands , which she completed in 1988 with a Bachelor of Science degree. She continued her studies at Concordia University in Montreal and obtained the degree of Master of Science in 1997 . Today she lives with her husband and two children in Seltjarnarnes near Reykjavík and works as an engineer on the Kárahnjúka Dam in eastern Iceland. Here she has been writing her books in her hut since 1998.

Yrsa Sigurðardóttir has written five children's books since 1998. In 2000 the Icelandic section of IBBY (International Board on Books for Young People; in German: International Board of Trustees for Young People's Books) honored Yrsa for her book Við viljum jólin í júlí .

In 2005 her first detective novel Þriðja táknið was published , in 2006 in Germany under the title The Last Ritual . This was followed in 2006 with Sér grefur gröf, a second crime novel, which appeared in Germany in 2007 under the title Das gefrorene Licht . Since then, she has added another detective novel or thriller every year . She is particularly successful in the German book market not only because she has placed a German lover, ex-police officer Matthias, by her humorous, single investigator, lawyer Þóra Guðmundsdóttir. Similar to the French second-job writer Fred Vargas , she manages two professions at the same time. Her detective novels are characterized by particularly gloomy scenes and their subtle affinity for the supernatural. A typical feature of Yrsa is the juxtaposition of several narrative strands, which - mostly from chapter to chapter - change from one scene to another and whose connections with one another only become visible in the course of the novel.

Her thriller Ég man þig , the German translation of which was published in 2011 under the title Geisterfjord , was filmed in 2017 under the title I Remember You .

The crime novel Brakið ( Death Ship ), published by Icelandic Veröld Verlag in 2011 , came out with an initial circulation of 16,000 copies, which is very high for Iceland.

Works

Series with Þóra Guðmundsdóttir

• 2005 Þriðja táknið.
  • German: The last ritual. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2006, ISBN 3-596-17132-6 .
• 2006 Sér grefur gröf.
  • German: The frozen light. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-596-17599-4 .
• 2007 Aska.
  • German: The glowing grave. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2008, ISBN 978-3-596-18140-7 .
• 2008 Auðnin.
  • German: The ice-blue trace. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2009, ISBN 978-3-596-18343-2 .
• 2009 Horfðu á mig.
  • German: night of fire. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2010, ISBN 978-3-596-18870-3 .
• 2011 Brakið.
  • German: Death Ship. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2012, ISBN 978-3-596-19493-3 .

Series with Commissioner Huldar and psychologist Freyja

• 2014 DNA.
  • German: DNA. btb Verlag, Munich 2016, ISBN 978-3-442-75656-8 .
• 2015 Sogið.
  • German: SOG. btb Verlag, Munich 2017, ISBN 978-3-442-75664-3 .
• 2016 Aflausn.
  • German: RIP btb Verlag, Munich 2019, ISBN 978-3-442-75665-0 .
• 2017 Gatið.
  • German: abyss. btb Verlag, Munich 2020, ISBN 978-3-442-75847-0 .
• 2018 Brúðan.

Other Icelandic crime stories

• 2010 Ég man þig.
  • German: Geisterfjord. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2011, ISBN 978-3-596-19273-1 .

• 2012 Kuldi.
  • German: souls in the ice. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2013, ISBN 978-3-596-19533-6

• 2014 Lygi.
  • German: Nebelmord. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2013, ISBN 978-3-596-03065-1

Children's thriller

• 2003 organic grain.
  • German: The IQ kids and the stolen intelligence. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2011, ISBN 978-3-596-85439-4 .

Audio books

• 2013 Seelen im Eis , Argon Verlag Berlin, read by Daniel Drewes , unabridged 6 CDs 409 min., ISBN 978-3-8398-1275-4
• 2014 Nebelmord , Argon Verlag Berlin, read by Daniel Drewes, author. Reading version 6 CDs 420 min., ISBN 978-3-8398-1338-6

Dóra-Guðmundsdóttir series

1. The last ritual. Argon Verlag, Berlin 2014, read by Christiane Marx , unabridged, playing time: 672 min.
2. The frozen light. Argon Verlag, Berlin 2014, read by Christiane Marx, unabridged, playing time: 729 min.
3. The glowing grave. Argon Verlag, Berlin 2014, read by Christiane Marx, unabridged, playing time: 666 min.
4. The ice-blue trail. Argon Verlag, Berlin 2014, read by Christiane Marx, unabridged, playing time: 627 min.
5. Night of fire. Argon Verlag, Berlin 2014, read by Christiane Marx, unabridged, playing time: 781 min.
6. Death ship. Argon Verlag, Berlin 2014, read by Christiane Marx, unabridged, playing time: 753 min.

Film adaptations

• 2017: I Remember You . Direction: Óskar Thór Axelsson , script: Óskar Thór Axelsson, Ottó Geir Borg, leading actors: Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson , Ágústa Eva Erlendsdóttir

Awards

• 2000 IBBY Honor List (International Board on Books for Young People) for Við viljum jólin í júlí
• 2011 Blóðdropinn (Icelandic National Crime Literature Award) for Ég man þig
• 2016 Palle-Rosenkrantz Prize for DNA

See also

• List of Icelandic-speaking writers
• List of crime writers

Web links

• Literature by and about Yrsa Sigurðardóttir in the catalog of the German National Library
• Yrsa Sigurðardóttir in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Yrsa Sigurðardóttir at S. Fischer Verlag
• Author interview 2010 at Schwedenkrimi.de
• Yrsa Sigurdardottir on Facebook

Individual evidence

1. ↑ New Outing From Iceland's Queen Of Crime ( Memento from January 16, 2012 in the Internet Archive )

Note: Icelanders are referred to by their first name or first and last name, but not just their surname. Further information can be found under Icelandic personal name .