Freyja A Novel

By: Margrét Ann Thors

Published by Spiegel & Grau LLC, 2026-07-07

The unsolved case of a young girl's disappearance reopens after twenty years in this moody, atmospheric debut of suspense set in Reykjavík and the Icelandic coast.

Unnur has secrets. A single mother to a beloved daughter, Lilja, she lives a deliberately quiet life in Reykjavík, working at a bakery under an assumed last name and pushing away haunting visions of the last summer of her childhood. Her safety--and Lilja's--now hinges on discretion. But when her ex-husband returns to Iceland and brings with him a new girlfriend, who seems to know more about Unnur than she's letting on, Unnur may finally have to face what happened long ago on a black sand beach in the remote Dark Valley--and the possibility that she herself might be responsible for her otherworldly friend Freyja's disappearance.

As a cold case investigation is launched and the intricate threads of past and present begin to entangle, Unnur must race to recover the broken memory of what happened all those years ago, or risk losing her own daughter. Steeped in stories from Icelandic folklore and myth, Freyja is at once a gripping story of a child's disappearance, a testament to the power of a mother's love, and an enthralling tale of redemption and forgiveness from a gifted new voice.