🔗 Share this article

In the early hours of the 7th of April 1990, a catastrophic blaze broke out on board the MS Scandinavian Star, a passenger ferry traveling between Oslo and Frederikshavn. Inadequate staff training along with jammed safety doors aided the propagation of the flames, while toxic cyanide gas emitted from burning materials caused the loss of 159 people. At first, the tragedy was attributed to a traveler—a lorry driver with a history of arson. Since this suspect too died in the fire and was unable to refute the accusations, the full truth about the disaster stayed hidden for a long time. It wasn't until 2020 that a comprehensive documentary revealed the fire was likely set deliberately as part of an insurance fraud.

Nordenhof's Literary Sequence: An Overview

In the first volume of Nordenhof's Scandinavian Star series, Money to Burn, an unnamed protagonist is riding on a public transport through the Danish capital when she notices an elderly man on the sidewalk. As the vehicle drives away, she experiences an “eerie sense” that she is taking a piece of him with her. Compelled to retrace the route in search of him, the narrator finds herself in a landscape that is both alien and deeply familiar. She presents readers to Maggie and Kurt, whose connection is tested by the pressures of their troubled histories. In the final pages of that book, it is suggested that the source of the character's discontent may stem from a disastrous investment made on his behalf by a man referred to as T.

The Devil Book: A Unique Approach

The Devil Book opens with an lengthy prose poem in which the narrator explains her struggle to write T's narrative. “Within this volume, two,” she states, “we were supposed / to trace him / from youth up until / the evening / when he sat anticipating for / the report that / the fire / on the ferry / had successfully been / set.” Overwhelmed by the undertaking she has assigned herself and disrupted by the global health crisis, she tackles the story indirectly, as a form of allegory. “It occurred to me / that I / can do / whatever I want / so this / is my book / this is / for you / this is / an sensational story / about businessmen and / the devil.”

A tale gradually emerges of a woman who experiences lockdown in the UK capital with a near-unknown person and during those weeks relates to him what happened to her a decade before, when she accepted an offer from a man who professed to be the evil entity to grant all her wishes, so long as she didn't doubt his intentions. As the elements of the dual narratives become more intertwined, we begin to believe that they are identical—or at minimum that the nature of T is legion, for there are demonic forces everywhere.

Another blaze is present: an ardent, compelling dedication to literature as a political act

Pacts and Consequences: A Thematic Examination

Literature teach us that it is the dark figure who does deals, not God, and that we enter into them at our risk. But what if the narrator herself is the devil? A third narrative eventually emerges—the account of a girl whose childhood was marred by abuse and who was placed in a mental health facility, under duress to comply with social expectations or suffer more of the same. “[The devil] understands that in the game you've set for it, there are a pair of results: submit or remain a beast.” A third way out is ultimately unveiled through a collection of verses to the darkness that are simultaneously a call to arms against the forces of wealth and power.

Parallels and Readings: From Literature to Reality

Many British readers of Nordenhof's Scandinavian Star novels will think immediately of the London tower fire, which, though unintentional in cause, bears parallels in that the ensuing disaster and loss of life can be linked at least partly to the devil's bargain of putting financial gain over people. In these first two books of what is planned to be a seven-book series, the blaze on board the ferry and the series of deceptive transactions that culminated in mass murder are a sinister underlying element, showing themselves only in fleeting glimpses of detail or inference yet casting a growing influence over everything that occurs. Some readers may question how much it is feasible to interpret The Devil Book as a stand-alone piece, when its aim and meaning are so intricately bound into a larger narrative whose final form, at present, is uncertain.

Experimental Writing: Ethics and Aesthetics Intertwined

Some individuals—and I count myself as among them—who will fall in love with Nordenhof's endeavor purely as written art, as properly innovative writing whose ethical and creative intent are so profoundly entwined as to make them inseparable. “Write poems / for we require / that too.” There is another fire here: a passionate, magnetic devotion to writing as a political act. I will persist to pursue this literary journey, no matter where it leads.