by Edith Cody-Rice
Eliza Reid is having an amazing moment for a debut novelist. The Canadian raised former first lady of Iceland, buoyed by her best selling Secrets of the Sprakkar, published in 2022, is being extensively interviewed across Canada and the United States upon the publication of her first fiction, Death on the Island.
Ms. Reid is an activist, journalist and co-founder of the Iceland Writers Retreat. She was raised right next door in Ashton and on this trip, she has so far been a guest at the Ottawa International Writers Festival as well as being feted at events in Toronto, Gimli (home of a significant Icelandic community) and Winnipeg, then on to the United States. She has been interviewed by Tom Powers on CBC and by Shelagh Rogers at Winnipeg’s premier bookstore McNally Robinson Books.
And the book is worthy of the attention. Ms. Reid says that she wrote this murder mystery as a challenge. Her first book Secrets of the Sprakkar, she says, was based on interviews, familiar to her as she had interviewed many people as a journalist, and events in her own life. She confessed that she devoured Agatha Christie as a child and wanted to create a fictional mystery in the same mode, but set in Iceland. She also wanted her fiction to adopt the Canadian point of view and to reveal to readers the wonders of Iceland, a country she loves. She also aimed to highlight the work of diplomats and the frequently unheralded public service that they perform.
The author describes her novel as a classic British closed room mystery. The action takes place on the Westman Islands (Vestmannaeyjar in Icelandic) just off the south coast of Iceland. Gathered here for an art exhibition by a Canadian female artist, as well as the furtherance of an international business deal, are visitors from Reykjavík: the Canadian ambassador to Iceland, his wife, his deputy and her husband, the artist, and a best selling Canadian author and booker prize winner from Gimli Manitoba. Greeting them locally are the owner of a large fish processing plant,(the main employer on the Island) along with his wife, the owner of the upscale restaurant Skel where the death occurs, the head of the local folklore museum and the mayor of Heimaey, the village on the island. The mayor is grieving his partner who has just been found dead on the floor of the folklore museum.
The Canadians find themselves trapped on the island by bad weather that cancels the ferry service to the main island of Iceland. At a celebratory dinner on the first evening of their visit, the deputy ambassador collapses and dies suddenly after drinking a signature cocktail at the famous restaurant Skel.
Everyone of the characters has an interest, a personal concern, a complaint or a problem to solve in this forced together group. And each chapter is told from the point of view of one of characters. The chapters are also short, keeping the action dynamic, and perfect for bedtime reading.
There are a number of subplots which contribute to the twists and turns in the story. All of the characters are suspects in the murder and your mind runs through the possibilities as you read. But the denouement is still a surprise.
Eliza Reid uses an intriguing device. She starts with the murder, then moves the timeline back to days and then hours before the death. Once she has completed this for the first murder (there are two and possibly three – you’ll find out), she starts that process again but for a man and you do not know who the victim will be. Don’t skip ahead, it will spoil the tension.
Ms. Reid has a gift for setting a scene. The dialogue sounds authentic and the book contains many enticing Icelandic references, from the food to the greetings. The fact that key documents are written in Icelandic becomes important in the outcome.
Altogether a satisfying mystery read and it is gratifying to see all the Canadian connections and references in the book. Makes you feel quite at home.
As best selling mystery writer Louise Penny said in praising the book, “Death on the island is compulsive and propulsive reading. Not only wonderfully evocative of a little-known area of Iceland, it is also surprising with twists even a seasoned crime reader won’t see coming.”
published by Simon and Schuster
312 pages
available at Mill Steet Books in Almonte
