The King's Codex (2006)

The King's Codex (2006)

1955. A young Icelander travels to Denmark to study Old Norse under an eminent compatriot: a brilliant but deeply disturbed Professor who since the war years has never forgiven himself for submitting, under unbearable pressure, to extortion by the Nazis of his most precious charge: the Codex Regius of the Poetic Edda, the jewel in the crown of old Icelandic manuscripts.

Lost in the bombing at the end of the war, the manuscript is now sought after by a group of neo-Nazis. The Professor and his pupil embark on a hazardous journey across Europe in search of this priceless heirloom, a treasure that some people are willing to die and kill for. They find and recover it, but not without also finding, and then losing for ever, the eight leaves that have been missing from the manuscript since it first came to light in the seventeenth century.

This is both a fast-paced thriller and a fascinating blend of history and fiction, about what can be sacrificed – and what must be sacrificed – for this most precious gem of Iceland’s cultural inheritance.

R E V I E W S

Four stars of five possible. MISDAADROMANS, THE NETHERLANDS

Four stars of five possible. CRIMEZONE.NL, THE NETHERLANDS