Michael Ridpath: Where the Shadows Lie

There really was a Gaukur. He lived at Stong, a prosperous farm which was obliterated in the eruption of Hekla in 1104. Both the remains of the original building and the reconstruction a few miles away on the main Thjorsardalur Road are well worth seeing. His death at the hand of his foster-brother Asgrimur is mentioned in Njals Saga . Gaukur had his own saga which is referred to in the fourteenth century Modruvallabok, but it was never transcribed. The story that saga told remains unknown.

J.R.R. Tolkien taught Middle English at Leeds University from 1920 to 1925, where he instituted the ‘Viking Club’ with its beer and its Icelandic drinking songs. His letters show that after writing the first chapter of The Lord of the Rings at the end of 1937 he agonized for several months over how to continue the story and link it in with his earlier novel, The Hobbit. Where the Shadows Lie speculates upon a solution.

Iceland is a small country where everyone seems to know everyone else. It is quite possible that some of the characters in this book resemble real people. If so, such resemblance is completely coincidental.

I am thankful to the late Olafur Ragnarsson and Petur Mar Olafsson for first introducing me to Iceland. It was after this visit that I became determined to write a book set in the country – an ambition that took me fifteen years to achieve. I should also like to thank Sveinn H. Gudmarsson, Sigridur Gudmarsdottir, Superintendent Karl Steinar Valsson of the Reykjavik Metropolitan Police, Armann Jakobsson of the University of Iceland, Ragga Olafsdottir, Dagmar Thorsteinnsdottir, Gautur Sturluson, Brynjar Arnarsson and Helena Pang for their time and assistance. Richenda Todd, Janet Woffindin, Virginia Manzer, Toby Wyles, Stephanie Walker and Hilma Roest made many helpful comments on the manuscript. I am grateful to my agents, Carole Blake and Oli Munson, and to my publishers, Nicolas Cheetham at Corvus and Petur Mar Olafsson at Bjartur-Verold, for all their help. And lastly I would like to thank my wife Barbara for all her patience and support.