Jørn Lier Horst & Hans Jørgen Sandnes’ The Search for the Magician’s Tome is No. 1 on the official children’s bestseller list for the third month in a row. The activity book is joined also this month by the fifteenth book in the Detective Agency No. 2 series, Operation Sable Forest, which comes in at No. 5.
Jo Nesbø’s Knife, the twelfth Harry Hole novel, has gone straight to No. 2 on Der Spiegel’s bestseller list for hardcover fiction after being published by Ullstein in Germany just a week ago.
Selma Vilhunen’s Stupid Young Heart will be Finland’s submission for ‘Best International Feature Film’ at the Academy awards. The celebrated film had its world premiere at the 2018 Toronto International Film Festival and won the Crystal Bear for ‘Best Youth Film’ at the 2019 Berlinale.
Stupid Young Heart tells the story of a group of teenagers grappling with the unexpected grown-up problem of pregnancy while far right ideas start to spread in their multicultural neighborhood.
The Academy award nominations in the International Feature Film category will be announced on January 13th, 2020.
A tribute concert featuring the music of Avicii will take place on December 5th in Stockholm, Sweden. The concert will feature 19 of the original singers on Avicii’s biggest hits as well as opening sets from friends like David Guetta, Kygo, Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike, Laidback Luke and Nicky Romero. The participating singers — Aloe Blacc, Adam Lambert, Alex Ebert, Rita Ora, Joe Janiak and more — will perform alongside a 30-piece band in a two-hour headlining set at the Friends Arena in Stockholm.
All net profits from the Avicii Tribute Concert for Mental Health Awareness, which is produced by the foundation bearing Avicii’s real name, Tim Bergling, will go to supporting organizations which address mental health needs and suicide prevention.
Read more in Variety by clicking “Read more” below.
The feature film The Informer, based on the novel Three Seconds by Roslund & Hellström, is released nationwide in theatres in the UK today. Several of the biggest UK newspapers are already lauding the film, which is directed by Andrea Di Stefano, and stars Joel Kinnaman, Rosamund Pike and Ana de Armas in the lead roles.
“Joel Kinnaman stars in a sharp, cunning crime thriller. /…/ The Informer is one of the year’s more pleasant genre surprises: a clenched fist of a crime thriller in the mode of The Departed or The Town, in which every element is just a notch smarter than you’d expect. […] it holds together absorbingly, thanks to a sturdy script which ups stakes and adds characters with cunning and intelligence. /…/ While gritty genre fare gravitates more and more to the small screen, it’s strangely satisfying to watch two hours spent doing business the old way.”
-Telegraph, UK
“It’s a genuinely tense, gritty, New York City-set drama with a compelling leading man in Joel Kinnaman, and solid support from Rosamund Pike, whose fragrant English Rose period is now just a distant memory. /…/ That’s an admirably multinational team behind a film that feels not just distinctly American but carries that particular whiff of New York City underbelly, of sweat and pretzels and acrid steam rising from subway gratings.”
-Daily Mail, UK
“Old-school twisty thriller holds its best tricks until the end. /…/ This hard-edged, old-school crime thriller is a resolutely grim and increasingly violent affair, and holds your attention with a hardworking cast, decent production values and a twisty story which holds its best tricks until the end.”
-Daily Mirror, UK
“Gripping tale of brawn and bloodshed behind bars. /…/ Rosamund Pike is an FBI agent who sends an ex-con undercover in a gritty crime drama that drips with menace. This is a tough, muscular, sweaty thriller […] its world reeking with cynicism and fear.”
-The Guardian, UK
“It’s pulled off with slick effectiveness and has enough bumps in the road to demand your attention to the end.”
–The Times, UK
Anders Roslund once again grabs three spots on the official weekly Swedish bestseller lists, where his Knock Knock is now No. 2 in hardcover and audio, and No. 3 in e-books. On the audio list is also Jo Nesbø with Knife, at No. 4, and Stina Jackson with The Silver Road, at No. 5. Nesbø’s twelfth Harry Hole novel also comes in at No. 5 in e-book.
Today is the theatrical release for 438 Days, and the anticipated film has already received great praise in Swedish press.
“438 Days is uninterruptedly thrilling and entertaining.”
–Aftonbladet
“A grandiose film of Hollywood proportions.”
–Göteborgs-Posten
“438 Days is one of the best Swedish films of the year.”
–Filmtopp.se
“[Ganslandt and Birro] have made a suspenseful and well-made thriller that dares to be both drama and feel good.”
-_TT_
“A very entertaining film not to be missed!”
–Filmparadiset.se
438 Days is directed by Jesper Ganslandt, written by Peter Birro, and produced by Miso Film.
The spy thriller series Agent Hamilton, based on Jan Guillou’s bestselling Hamilton novels, will see its world premiere held in October at the largest TV market in the world: MIPCOM.
Petter Rosenlund is the show’s head writer and Erik Leijonborg its lead and conceptual director, supported by Lisa Farzaneh and Per Hanefjord.
In the series, Swedish agent Carl Hamilton is caught up in the investigation of a terrorist attack committed by extremists. At the same time, key locations in Sweden are hit by a series of cyber-attacks requiring highly sophisticated skills. Despite having officially left the Swedish intelligence service, Hamilton is now back to defend his country and soon finds himself in the middle of a life-threatening mission against an invisible enemy with traces leading back to Russian, Swedish and US intelligence forces.
Agent Hamilton is produced by Dramacorp/Pampas Studios for C More/TV4.
Dagens Nyheter, Sweden’s largest newspaper, has chosen Jørn Lier Horst’s The Cabin and Niklas Natt och Dag’s 1794 as two crime novels to look forward to this fall. The Cabin is Horst’s second book in the Cold Case Quartet, and 1794 is the sequel to Natt och Dag’s The Wolf and the Watchman.
Serbia, Dokaz
Two-book deal closed by Emma Granberg
Lithuania, Alma Littera
Two-book deal closed by Emma Granberg
Finland, Otava
Two-book deal closed by Ida Schabbauer
Azerbaijan, Alatoran
Closed by Emma Granberg
Romania, Editura Trei
Closed by Emma Granberg
France, Gallimard
Two-book deal closed by Julia Angelin
In every way, this is a generous, warmly friendly, funny, and thoroughly delightful series of books.
– BTJ
A brilliant novel that – without false pathos – beautifully addresses aging, saying goodbye, and reflecting on one’s own successes and failures. A highly recommended debut novel!
– Belletristik Couch
I’m impressed. Moved. Feeling speechless and struggling to put my experience into words. You’re the One I Write About is a strong, beautiful and exhilarating read.
– Agneta Norrgård, literary critic
Two giants of Nordic thrillers are here joining forces to launch a series. (…) Johana Gustawsson and Thomas Enger orchestrate a formidable mechanism where everyone seems to be concealing a piece of the truth.
– Envols
[I]t’s an unconditionally truthful book about our time and its excesses. Kristín Eiríksdottir has captured this atmosphere perfectly in her novel.
– NDR
Nowhere Land/Women in Revolt is the first part of a trilogy. It is about being so young that life is a horizon of possibilities and resistance, about what it takes to become an artist, and what stories one tells when nothing has yet happened.