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During the early hours of April 7 1990, a catastrophic blaze erupted aboard the MS Scandinavian Star, a passenger ferry traveling between Frederikshavn and Oslo. Inadequate crew preparedness combined with jammed fire doors aided the spread of the flames, while toxic hydrogen cyanide gas emitted from combusting laminates led to the deaths of 159 people. At first, the disaster was attributed to a passenger—a truck driver with a record of arson. Given that this suspect also died in the fire and was not able to defend himself, the full facts regarding the event stayed concealed for many years. It wasn't until 2020 that a detailed documentary disclosed the fire was likely set intentionally as part of an insurance fraud.

Asta Olivia Nordenhof's Literary Series: An Overview

Within the initial book of Asta Olivia Nordenhof's epic series, Money to Burn, an unidentified protagonist is riding on a bus through Copenhagen when she notices an elderly man on the street. As the bus moves away, she feels an “eerie sense” that she is carrying a part of him with her. Compelled to retrace the route in pursuit of him, the character enters a landscape that is both unfamiliar and strangely known. She introduces readers to a couple named Maggie and Kurt, whose relationship is tested by the pressures of their troubled histories. In the concluding section of that volume, it is implied that the root of Kurt's discontent may originate in a poor financial decision made on his account by a individual known as T.

This New Volume: A Unique Approach

The Devil Book opens with an extended poetic passage in which the narrator describes her struggle to write T's story. “In this second volume,” she states, “we were supposed / to follow him / from youth up until / the evening / when he sat waiting for / the report that / the fire / on the ferry / had effectively been / set.” Overwhelmed by the undertaking she has set herself and disrupted by the global health crisis, she tackles the story obliquely, as a type 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 sensational story / about businessmen and / the dark force.”

A narrative slowly emerges of a woman who experiences lockdown in London with a near-unknown person and over the course of those days relates to him what occurred to her a ten years earlier, when she agreed to an offer from a figure who claimed to be the evil entity to grant all her wishes, so long as she didn't question his intentions. As the elements of the dual narratives become more intertwined, we begin to believe that they are identical—or at minimum that the nature of T is legion, for there are devils all around.

There is another fire here: a passionate, compelling dedication to literature as a political act

Pacts and Consequences: A Literary Examination

Classic stories teach us that it is the dark figure who does deals, not God, and that we enter into them at our peril. But suppose the narrator herself is the devil? A third storyline eventually emerges—the story of a girl whose childhood was marred by abuse and who spent time in a psychiatric hospital, under duress to comply with societal norms or endure further harm. “[This entity] knows that in the scenario you've created for it, there are two outcomes: surrender or remain a monster.” A alternative path is ultimately unveiled through a collection of poems to the night that are also a call to arms against the influences of wealth and power.

Parallels and Readings: From Fiction to Real Events

Numerous UK audience members of the author's series novels will reflect right away of the London tower tragedy, which, though accidental in origin, shares parallels in that the resulting tragedy and fatalities can be linked at in part to the dangerous trade-off of prioritizing financial gain over people. In these initial books of what is projected to be a multi-volume series, the fire aboard the ferry and the series of deceptive business deals that ended in multiple deaths are a ominous background presence, showing themselves only in fleeting flashes of detail or inference yet casting a deepening influence over all that transpires. Certain individuals may question how far it is feasible to interpret this volume as a stand-alone work, when its purpose and significance are so deeply bound 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 among them—who will fall in love with the author's project purely as written art, as truly experimental writing whose ethical and artistic intent are so deeply entwined as to make them inseparable. “Compose verses / for we need / that too.” There is another fire here: a passionate, attractive commitment to the craft as a political act. I intend to continue to follow this literary journey, wherever it goes.