Viking Magazine - July 2015 - 38

Q&A
Murder She Wrote
In Karin Fossum's best-selling thrillers, all that separates person
from killer is a single moment when everything goes wrong.
BY MEGAN BORGERT-SPANIOL
E
very queen requires
a throne, a high and
mighty place from
which to bid her subjects. For
Karin Fossum, that place is the
living room of a little house in
the Nordic countryside. It is
from this humble perch that
Norway's " Queen of Crime "
sends ordinary people down
dark and twisted paths in her
best-selling Inspector Sejer series.
Now translated into more than
30 languages, the books have
earned Fossum countless honors
and a place among Norway's
crime-writing elite. Viking spoke
with Fossum about modest
beginnings and believable
stories.
Q What were you doing
before you started writing
crime fi ction?
A I never went to a university.
I was 15 ½ when I left home
and started to work. I have
been a taxi driver, worked
in a supermarket, been in
hospitals and kindergartens
and institutions. I worked with
people with Down syndrome,
autism and drug addiction. I
have no education, but I was
reading all those years.
Q What do you think makes a
crime story believable?
A I'm not interested in the serial
killer. That's not what people
are afraid of in their daily life.
Sometimes very small things
38 VIKING JULY 2015
sonsofnorway.com
can scare us to death. Like the
doorbell: the doorbell doesn't
scare you in the morning, but
it scares you at two o'clock at
night. So I try to make a great
fear out of small things. My
main concern is not the evil
person who kills again and
again, but the very good
person who kills once. That's
much scarier.
Q From where do you draw
inspiration for your stories
and characters?
A I am inspired by other
writers; I'm inspired by people
I know and have known; I'm
inspired by the news. Every
time I read the newspaper about
someone who had committed
a murder, I realize he has a
mother and father and brother
and daughter, and was a good
person. But we never get to
know that. I try to go behind
the news story and show the
rest of his life. He wanted the
same things that we do, but for
some reason he didn't achieve
it. Something went wrong, and
in my books, everything goes
wrong in one moment.
Q Tell us about your
involvement in the television/
movie adaptations of
your books.
A They can consult me when
it comes to the script or the
dialogue. If I have opinions,
sometimes they listen and
sometimes they don't. But I
don't know much about fi lm;
I have no such skills. I watch
it when it's ready, but I don't
care too much about it. That's
not my work. I prefer just to get
up in the morning and be in my
little house and write my stories,
and all the things that happen
outside . . . I just let it happen,
in a way.
Q What will be your next
book?
A My next book is actually
a collection of poetry. It is my
hope [to write more Inspector
Sejer books], but I'm not 40
anymore. I get more tired, and
I'm more careful about making
promises for the future. But as
long as this is a passion, I will
continue. If I start to get bored
I will sit down and read all
the other writers instead. And
actually, I'm looking forward to
that. I'm looking forward to rest
and to read all the others.
Name: Karin Fossum
Born: 1954
Current
Home:
Sylling, Norway
Upcoming
Release:
The Drowned Boy
(Inspector Sejer),
August 2015
Read more from the interview on July 15 at sonsofnorway.com/blog.
PHOTO BY BO-AJE MELLIN
http://www.sonsofnorway.com/blog http://www.sonsofnorway.com
Viking Magazine - July 2015

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