On the Cold Coasts - Softcover

Davidsdottir, Vilborg

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1611090954 ISBN 13: 9781611090956

Publisher: Amazon Crossing, 2012

Synopsis

When a fleet of one hundred English ships is caught in a horrible storm off the cold coasts of fifteenth-century Iceland, twenty-five ships are lost. For Ragna, the daughter of a respected family and betrothed to Thorkell, her relationship with one of the seamen washed ashore results in pregnancy. Now barren due to a traumatic childbirth and stigmatized as a fallen woman, she is left with no prospects for marriage when the betrothal is ultimately canceled.

A decade later, Ragna becomes a housekeeper to the new English bishop in North Iceland, where passionate and ambitious Thorkell is a priest and steward. They embark on a fervent but doomed love affair as priests cannot marry and Ragna will not be a concubine. Little does Ragna know but her host, the bishop, is instigating the conflict between the English and Nordic settlers to his own gain, with a devastating impact on his housekeeper. As sweeping as it is intimate, On the Cold Coasts is a powerful, enduring story of love and personal sacrifice.

About this title

Review:

The World of On the Cold Coasts

The scene is 15th century Iceland. The country, as well as all of Scandinavia, is ruled by a single monarch, King Eric, who resides in Denmark. The king’s archbishop, whose seat is in Nidaros, Norway, has authority over the Icelandic church. The Nordic countries are united in the so-called Kalmar Union, and only merchants from within the Union are permitted to trade with Iceland. Yet not many venture to make the journey from Scandinavia to this distant island in the North Atlantic.

Not so the English. Ignoring King Eric’s embargo, about 100 ships sail from England to Iceland each summer, seeking out the abundant fishing grounds. They also trade English flour, ale, wine, boots and other commodities for Icelandic stock fish, woolen cloth and sulphur, which is used for gunpowder in England’s ongoing war with the French. To strengthen their interests, the English persuade the Pope in Rome, the highest authority of the church, to appoint an English bishop in Iceland, to assist in them in trade and other dealings with the natives.

About the Author:

Vilborg Davidsdottir earned a degree in media studies from the University of Iceland in 1991 as well as a bachelor’s in folkloristics and English in 2005 and a master’s degree in folkloristics in 2011. She worked in the media for fifteen years as a journalist, radio programmer, and TV reporter but has focused on her writing since 2000. She has written six novels, three of which—By the Well of Fates (1993), The Norns Judgement (1994), and Audur (2009)—take place during the Viking Age in Iceland, Scandinavia, Scotland, and Ireland. Her other three novels—Sacrifice (1997), On the Cold Coasts (2000), and Raven (2005)—are set in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Iceland and Greenland. On the Cold Coasts is her first book to be translated into English. Vilborg lives in Reykjavik with her husband and is the mother of three children, aged seven, seventeen, and twenty-four.

[photo credit –c- Johann Pall Valdimarsson]

 

Alda Sigmundsdottir is a writer, journalist, and translator. She grew up in Iceland, Canada, and Cyprus, and she has also lived in Great Britain and Germany. Her translation work spans almost two decades and incorporates everything from annual reports to literature. She chronicled Iceland’s economic meltdown on her English-language blog, “The Iceland Weather Report,” and has subsequently been a frequent commentator and lecturer on her country’s social and economic situation. She has also written extensively about Iceland for the foreign press. Her first book, The Little Book of the Icelanders, will be published by Forlagid in spring 2012.

About this edition

• Publisher: Amazon Crossing
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1611090954
• ISBN 13: 9781611090956
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 218