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In the early hours of the 7th of April 1990, a catastrophic fire erupted on board the ferry Scandinavian Star, a car and passenger ferry operating between Frederikshavn and Oslo. Insufficient staff training along with malfunctioning safety doors accelerated the spread of the flames, while toxic cyanide gas emitted from burning materials caused the loss of 159 individuals. Initially, the tragedy was attributed to a traveler—a lorry driver with a history of fire-setting. Since this suspect also died in the fire and was not able to defend himself, the complete facts about the event remained hidden for many years. Only in 2020 that a comprehensive investigation disclosed the fire was probably set deliberately as part of an fraud scheme.

Nordenhof's Literary Sequence: An Overview

Within the initial book of Asta Olivia Nordenhof's Scandinavian Star sequence, the preceding volume, an unidentified narrator is riding on a bus through Copenhagen when she observes an elderly man on the street. As the bus moves away, she experiences an “uncanny feeling” that she is carrying a piece of him with her. Driven to repeat the route in search of him, the narrator finds herself in a setting that is both unfamiliar and strangely known. She introduces us to a couple named Maggie and Kurt, whose relationship is strained by the pressures of their conflicted pasts. In the final pages of that volume, it is implied that the root of Kurt's disaffection may stem from a poor investment made on his behalf by a man referred to as T.

The Devil Book: A Unique Narrative Style

This second installment opens with an extended poetic passage in which the narrator describes her challenge to compose T's narrative. “In this volume, two,” she writes, “we were meant / to trace him / from childhood up until / the night / when he sat anticipating for / the report that / the blaze / on the Scandinavian Star / had effectively been / set.” Overwhelmed by the undertaking she has set herself and derailed by the pandemic, she tackles the tale obliquely, as a form of allegory. “I came to think / that I / can do / whatever I want / so this / is my work / this is / for you / this is / an erotic thriller / about businessmen and / the devil.”

A tale slowly emerges of a female character who experiences lockdown in the UK capital with a virtual stranger and during those weeks relates to him what happened to her a ten years earlier, when she agreed to an offer from a figure who professed to be the evil entity to grant all her wishes, so long as she didn't doubt his motives. As the elements of the dual narratives become more interwoven, we start to believe that they are identical—or at the very least that the identity of T is legion, for there are demonic forces everywhere.

There is another fire here: a passionate, magnetic dedication to writing as a political act

Deals with the Devil: A Thematic Examination

Literature instruct us that it is the dark figure who does bargains, not a divine being, and that we enter into them at our peril. But what if the narrator herself is the malevolent force? A third narrative comes finally to light—the story of a girl whose childhood was scarred by abuse and who was placed in a mental health facility, under duress to comply with societal norms or endure more of the same. “[The devil] knows that in the scenario you've created for it, there are a pair of outcomes: surrender or remain a monster.” A alternative path is ultimately revealed through a series of verses to the darkness that are simultaneously a rallying cry against the influences of wealth and power.

Connections and Interpretations: From Fiction to Real Events

Numerous British audience members of Nordenhof's series books will reflect immediately of the Grenfell Tower tragedy, which, though unintentional in origin, shares similarities in that the ensuing tragedy and fatalities can be linked at in part to the devil's bargain of putting profit over human lives. In these initial books of what is projected to be a multi-volume series, the fire aboard the ship and the series of deceptive transactions that ended in multiple deaths are a sinister background element, revealing themselves only in brief glimpses of information or inference yet projecting a growing shadow over all that occurs. Some individuals may doubt how much it is possible to interpret The Devil Book as a stand-alone piece, when its purpose and meaning are so intricately tied into a larger narrative whose final form, at this stage, is uncertain.

Innovative Prose: Ethics and Aesthetics Fused

There will be others—and I count myself as one of them—who will become enamored with the author's project purely as text, as truly experimental writing whose moral and artistic intent are so deeply entwined as to make them inextricable. “Compose verses / for we require / that as well.” There is another fire here: an intense, attractive commitment to the craft as a political act. I will persist to follow this series, wherever it goes.