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Frozen Out
- Gunnhildur Mystery, Book 1
- Narrated by: Mel Hudson
- Length: 10 hrs and 40 mins
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Summary
The discovery of a corpse washed up on a beach in an Icelandic backwater sparks a series of events that propels the village of Hvalvik's police sergeant Gunnhildur into deep waters. Although under pressure to deal with the matter quickly, she is suspicious that the man's death was no accident and once she has identified the body, sets about investigating his final hours. The case takes Gunnhildur away from her village and into a cosmopolitan world of shady deals, government corruption and violence. She finds herself alone and less than welcome in this hostile environment as she tries to find out who it was that made sure the young man drowned on a dark night one hundred kilometres from where he should have been - and why.
Although born in the UK in 1962, through a series of coincidences Quentin Bates found himself working in Iceland in his gap year. The gap year then became 10 years, during which time he managed to get himself married, produce a family, and generally go native in Iceland. The family then moved back to the UK in 1990 where Quentin became a full-time journalist on a commercial fishing magazine. Frozen Assets was born through the author's own inside knowledge of Iceland and its society, along with exploring the world of crime. He and his (Icelandic) wife frequently return to Iceland, where they have many friends, including several in the Reykjavik police.
What listeners say about Frozen Out
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Kims place
- 01-04-16
With difficulty!
Is there anything you would change about this book?
Make the names a little more English. I had to keep rewinding to remember who was who, bit frustrating.
Was Frozen Out worth the listening time?
Yes and no. I loved the narration, especially the different English accents. The story wants you to stay with it and get to the end. I found myself thinking of other things while listening, not a good sign. The story was slow and there is a definite lack of excitement.
Any additional comments?
I am going to give book 2 a chance as I have already bought it.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall
- Swyddfa
- 10-04-19
Gripping
Just as I expected from this author - nail-biting to the last page. Thoroughly good read.
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- JulieB
- 04-01-21
Disappointing
I love a good Scandi Noir so was really looking forward to finding a new series to get my teeth into but sadly this isn’t it.
I liked Gunnhilder and the young journalist shadowing her and getting involved in the case was a promising element but why can she only address him as “young man” every time they meet, this becomes irritating very quickly. In fact the dialogue throughout is pretty awful. The story itself is quite long winded, I don’t have a problem with being challenged, in fact this usually heightens my enjoyment, but this story doesn’t develop any kind of climax and at the end just hits a brick wall. I really thought I’d missed a large chunk of the book as it just seemed to end.
Stylistically it is very obvious the author is not Icelandic, the setting and the names are the only authentic elements. The pace is all wrong and there are none of the rich atmospheric descriptions that are so appealing.
This aspect isn’t helped by the narration. The narrator has a very pleasant voice and is easy to listen to, on the whole! She does an amazing job with the Icelandic names that just seem to trip from her tongue, but only one character is voiced with anything nearing an Icelandic accent everyone else is given a bad regional British accent - why do all the male police officers sound like east end gangsters??? It’s such a shame because if the narrator had simply used her natural voice I might have been prepared to give more of the series a go to see if the writing improves but sadly I’ll be stopping here.
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- Dragon
- 19-06-16
Entertaining Icelandic murder, nice heroine
Enjoyed this one on the car stereo while driving around Iceland on holiday! Great reading. Good pace story with some nice and some baddy characters. Believable female protagonist. Recommended.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Jules Blunt
- 08-02-15
Good easy listening but a bit long
Could hv bn a bit shorter and still conveyed the story. Well read and interesting but not a page turner for me
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2 people found this helpful
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- Derek
- 17-02-16
Excellent writing
This has all the elements of a good crime novel... Characterisation, interest both criminal and personal and a great storyline.
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- Rachel
- 23-06-13
Thoroughly Entertaining
Definitely something I will be listening to again, well narrated as long as you can handle those long Icelandic names.
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4 people found this helpful
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- Heike
- 17-01-14
Icelandic Crime
I really liked this book and hence bought book 2&3 of this series and hope there will be more to come. I agree that the Icelandic names are hard to digest. On the other side I really liked the female detective, a single mother who is not a beauty queen and tries hard to bring shift work and family life together.
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3 people found this helpful
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- mollyeyre
- 16-05-17
Excellent
I really enjoyed this book, I haven't read anything by Quentin Bates so I didn't know what to expect. I enjoyed his characters, (and hated some - as was appropriate), they seemed to act in an intelligent way.
I found a little problem with the names - but I was able to rerun a couple of times to work out who was in the action!! This is down to MY not being used to Icelandic names - and it didn't spoil the story.
A well crafted tale, very satisfying.
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3 people found this helpful
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- sheila
- 09-07-20
Very different type of book
I really enjoyed this book . We were lucky enough to visit Iceland last year and it really took me back
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