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Hell is a story which mesmerises its reader in the beginning, gives hope for some illumination but eventually does not lead anywhere and leaves the reader in the dark.

Heaven is missing from the story. Hell is present. Earth is also present. The reader is dissatisfied. In faith he embarked on this journey with an unseen, omniscient third person narrator. He follows a boy who remains anonymous throughout. This boy has a best buddy, an idol whom he looks up to. His idol Barthur is not short of admirers, including Andrea who is twenty years older. Her poor husband Petur is losing her but cannot figure out why. The reader never gets to know more because Barthur dies. He dies on a fishing expedition lead by Petur, for a most pointless reason. He is so engrossed in reading Milton’s Paradise Lost that he forgets to bring his splash jacket and he freezes to death. The reader has to get used to the translation from the Icelandic language but adapts fairly quickly. The prose is lush, lyrical and beautiful. The narrative of the journey out to sea has an otherworldly feel, like one is traveling to a zone between life and death. Barthur dies and his body is brought back to land. This is when the boy embarks on a second journey, to return the book Paradise Lost to its owner, a blind curmudgeon of an old sea captain by the name of Kolbeinn. The boy’s trip to the village through majestic and lush landscapes is again beautifully described. But after the boy reaches his destination, the story takes a different style and direction. From ethereal and mystical, it becomes earthbound and mundane. The reader is introduced to a host of characters who have little bearing on the resolution to the problem of Barthur’s demise. The village is full of imperfect people and failed relationships. However, the reader feels nothing for them. Only for the boy who feels lost and lonely without his role model and has only his raging hormones to direct him. He settles down in the village pub. Then that’s all. The reader is left unfulfilled.