Why a Booktrail?
2000s: An American woman wakes up in a tent in the Norwegian mountains. She is completely alone.
The Gradual Disappearance of Jane Ashland
What you need to know before your trail
An American woman wakes up in a tent in the Norwegian mountains. Outside a storm rages and the fog is dense. Her phone is dead. She is completely alone.
Her name is Jane Ashland, and her life has spiralled out of control.
Moving between Jane’s past and this extraordinary remote landscape, Nicolai Houm weaves a dramatic trail of suspense through one woman’s life – via love, grief, and a devastating accident that changes everything.
Travel Guide
Norway
Norway is Nicolai Houm’s home country, and the landscape he describes and evokes is raw and remote. This Norwegian wilderness acts as a key antagonist in the woman’s fate:
“Beyond that stone begins the territory you must keep out of, Over there the negative force can get out. That is why you have to staying this side of the stone. Stick to the area between the tend and the stone., right?
This is the landscape that Jane becomes lost in, literally and figuratively. This is also a country examined and placed under the spotlight. Jane is left, lost adrift in the middle of nowhere and she wakes up under the banner of tragedy and lost hope. The mountains hold their secrets until towards the end of the novel.
And as Hemingway is quoted as saying in this novel: “Madame, all stories, if continued long enough, end in death.”
Dombås
“Dombås looked like an administrative outpost in Alaska with a tourist market thrown in. The sun beat straight down the sidewalk and filled the shopping street with still, amber light.”
Booktrailer Review
Susan: @thebooktrailer
They say beautiful things come in small packages and this is one of them. The cover and the setting of the story are very nicely drawn – an ethereal green cover, the setting of the Norwegian mountains, remote and raw.
The story however is one of darkness, grief, addiction and loss. Against such a stunning background, the trauma was even stronger and I found the mountains and landscape was actually one of Jane’s worst enemies after all. She is stuck there, without a phone, on her own, and then we find out how and why she got there.
Jane’s story is told with flashbacks throughout her life as she thinks about what’s brought her to this point. It’s very thought provoking but very bleak and I did find it a bit too bleak in places. This is Jane’s journey but she takes you, the reader, with her.
Booktrail Boarding Pass: The Gradual Disappearance of Jane Ashland
Destination : Norway Author/Guide: Nicolai Houm Departure Time: 2000s
Back to ResultsWhere Next?
