I’ve been putting off writing this review because I’m not sure what to say about Norse Mythology. It’s…. fine? I neither especially loved or hated it. Thor is more of an idiot than in the Marvel movies and Loki is just as chaotic but less deliberately evil/angry. It’s short stories, and they were probably told around a campfire whilst drinking back in the year 1000. You can’t get too long of a story in that circumstance.
It’s a sold three stars: enjoyable, but I’d be surprised if I’ll remember it in six months.
The 100-Year-Old Man who Climbed out the Window and Disappeared should have been a fun read. It’s whimsical; there’s a quest, which I always enjoy; there’s a bit of magical realism to it all; there’s a fair bit about 20th century history. But it wasn’t.
I’m not sure why, honestly. It might have been too whimsical and farfetched. It might have needed to go further into the magical realism of it all. Maybe it was trying to be One Hundred Years of Solitude and failing miserably? I don’t know.
Anyway, I set it down after awhile and didn’t care to pick it back up. Sometimes books are like that.
The cruise stopped at other ports too – we explored a number of towns. I’ve narrowed the photos down to a couple of the larger cities: Stavanger and Molde. Molde was the furthest north we went, and we were there only a day or two after the summer solstice. The sun rose at 3:30am and set at 11:30pm. How did we sleep? Blackout curtains.
This is the view of old Stavanger from the port (I took this from the balcony of our room on the ship). There are strict regulations about the buildings in this section of town, obviously. Including: only very small signs for stores are allowed. So there’s little in the way of tourist schlock available for sale. It was lovely.
This giant anchor was outside of the maritime museum. It’s HUGE.
Have I mentioned that there were flowers everywhere in Norway? People definitely take advantage of summer to make everything prettier.
This was a little alleyway in Stavanger’s old town. I like the flowers and the lamppost.
Stavanger’s cathedral. It was closed to repair the organ – and had been for more than a year – and was going to be re-opened the week after we were there. Le sigh.
Stavanger had a regular shopping district, too. This was clearly the shopping center for the town, full of locals and tourists alike. This one street, though, is the brightly colored hipster center for Stavanger.
See? Hipster center. Look at the bunting and the deer and the colors. You could buy everything on Etsy, I’m sure of it.
There’s even a manic pixie dream troll. Where else but Norway would you find one?
This mural – women supporting each other and looking cute – tickles me.
I couldn’t *not* get a picture of the local bookstore, could I?
The rest of Stavanger’s shopping district looked more like this: cobblestone streets, white buildings, colorful windows. This is a statue of an old seaman or viking. He has personality.
Then it was on to Molde. They love flowers so much, they’ve got their own rose variety. She’s celebrating that.
The town center of Molde – the torget. Molde is fairly small and very modern. The King of Norway hid here for a bit during WWII, so the Nazis destroyed the city. It’s all been rebuilt.
We also visited Alesund, which has lovely art nouveau buildings. Wilhem II used to vacation there with his family; there was a fire in the early 1900s that burned down about half the town. So Wilhelm foot the bill for rebuilding it, hiring the best European architects. The result is a fabulous art nouveau city. But I was sick during that port visit, so I didn’t get to see it. My husband and daughter tell me it was very pretty.
We took a cruise through the Norwegian fjords while in Scandinavia. (In fact, the cruise was the reason for the trip.) We did two shore excursions that involved animals: we went to a goat farm and to the Norwegian Fjord Horse Centre. The center works to preserve the breed, which is the only one native to Scandinavia. Mountainous western Norway is particularly suited to goat farming, since the goats like the mountains – there’s not enough room for cows.
My husband feeding a baby goat. Baby goats are cute.
Foals – baby horses – are also cute. And tiny.
This is one of the handlers riding two horses at once. It was impressive.
An award-winning stallion. He’s a very good example of his breed, apparently.
Bergen is a lovely town of about 200,000 people on the coast of Norway. It’s the second biggest city (after Oslo), and we had a great time exploring it.
Funicular
There’s a funicular that takes you to the top of the surrounding hills. There are tons of hiking trails across these hills – we saw at least two big groups of people with packs on getting ready for a multi-day hike. There’s also a restaurant and gift shop at the top. So you can go up for an hour or two as well.
There’s also a troll garden at the top of the funicular, hidden in the forest. This hipster troll is the one who greets you at the entrance. (You can see other trolls in the background.)
Sometimes, the trolls are hiding. (This one feels very Wallace & Gromit-y to me. I think it’s the hands.)
Hanseatic League Remember your history lessons, where you learned that the Black Plague killed 1/3 of the European population? Well, the disease had a 50% fatality rate in Norway and 80% in Bergen. That’s right, after the Black Plague came through, only 20% of Bergen was left standing. That’s when the Hanseatic League came in to take over the business side of things.
This is a dried stockfish. I was told they keep forever, and to eat them, you just need to soak it in water for 24 hours. This is what the Hansa were trading.
We took a tour of the Hanseatic Museum – this is one of the teapots.
This is a view across the harbor to the Hansa buildings. We were grabbing lunch and plotting out our afternoon. Note that the outdoor seating in Norwegian restaurants comes with blankets.
City Center
Bergen isn’t big, but we did leave the harbor for a bit to walk around the city center. There’s a nice pedestrian shopping district (I bought a sweater from Moods of Norway) and some lovely buildings from the 1800s-ish.
A statue of Edward Grieg. He’s from Bergen and they’re very proud of him. If we’d had another day, we’d’ve gone to his house (it’s a museum now).
A gazebo in a park. I don’t remember much about it, except for the fact that I thought it was pretty.
This isn’t anyone in particular, just a violinist looking very intense. His intensity is mitigated by the tranquil sounds of the water.
Just beyond the previous statue, there’s a lovely boulevard leading to some governmental building.
Old Town Then it was time to head back. We went back through the old part of the town, exploring some of the twistier streets.
My husband and daughter walking down one of the wider old twisty streets.
My feet and shopping bag along with an interesting manhole cover.
More old Hansa buildings. Fun fact: because the Norwegians always built with wood, they had a fire problem. After a big fire, they’d dump all the burnt wood into the harbor and then build the new houses on the landfill. Then the landfill would settle. These might have been built straight, but they aren’t anymore.
Doesn’t every building need a golden stag head?
An alleyway between some of those buildings. Right angles, schmight angles.
After you go down the alleyway, it opens up into a little courtyard full of cafes and giftshops. I imagine that ladder was important back in the day before this was the tourist section of town. Was that the front door?
I didn’t manage to get any good photos of Rosenkrantz Tower or Hakonshall – the two big medieval buildings in Bergen. But they did have this lovely little minimalist cafe where I had a cup of tea and my daughter had a frozen snickers bar. (Ice cream is HUGE in Norway. HUGE. It felt a little like being back in Wisconsin – where I grew up – but with more ice cream shops.)
If you’re spending time in Scandinavia, I’d definitely recommend a day or two in Bergen if you can fit it in.
What’s it about? Black Seconds is a mystery. At first, it might just be a disappearance. A young girl has left to ride her bike to the store for a magazine and some candy and never comes home. But as time goes on, it becomes more. It becomes about mistakes and her family and a particular friend she’s made who maybe isn’t entirely right in the head.
Why should you read it? Black Seconds sounds like it should be about something horrible, but it really isn’t. Or maybe it is, and you just don’t realize it because Karin Fossum’s spare writing treats all her characters with dignity and respect. No one is a caricature, no one’s exaggerated to make a point. It’s very stereotypically Scandinavian – Fossum is Norse, and the book takes place in small-town Norway. I quite enjoyed it.
