FICTION

The Third Realm

Penguin Pr. Oct. 2024. 512p. ISBN 9780593655214. $32. F
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A new star appears in the sky, and all is not right with the world. This installment of a multivolume novel, which follows The Morning Star (2021) and The Wolves of Eternity (2023), revisits characters whom readers have met before. Each chapter’s title names a narrator whose psyche and life unfold. Tove, a painter, struggles with mental health problems made worse by the star’s appearance. Her husband and three children bear the brunt of her descent into despair and destruction. Other characters include a philandering police detective investigating the gruesome murder of three members of a metal rock band; an undertaker who, with several doctors and scientists, discovers that no one in the country is dying once the star appears; and a woman pastor whose husband suspects her of infidelity. Evocative images of Norway’s fjords, climate, sky, and terrain accentuate the atmosphere of doom and tension.
VERDICT Knausgaard’s achievement in this novel is to combine Scandinavian crime fiction with science fiction, while integrating discussions of religion, philosophy, neurobiology, and music. A highly readable and compelling work by a major and prolific novelist.
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