Shortlisted for: 2011 Costa Novel Award

Painter Angelika Rossdal suddenly moves to Kvaloya, a small island deep in the Arctic Circle, with her young daughter, Liv, who grows up isolated and unable or unwilling to make friends her own age.

Spending much of her time alone, or with an elderly neighbour, Liv is beguiled with old folk tales and stories about trolls, mermaids and the huldra, a wild spirit who appears in the form of an irresistibly beautiful girl, to lure young men to their doom.

Now 28, Liv looks back on her life and to that summer when two boys drowned under mysterious circumstances off the shores of Kvaloya. As the summer continues and events take an even darker turn, Liv comes to believe that something supernatural is happening on the island. But is it?