One Of Us (True Crime) by Åsne Seierstad

Hardback:  In the tradition of Truman Capote's classic In Cold Blood (1965), One of Us (2015) is a powerful and gripping depiction of Anders Breivik, the terrorist atrocities in Norway and their aftermath.

She ran.  Up the hill, through the moss.  Her wellingtons sank into the wet earth.  The forest floor squelched beneath her feet.  She had seen him fire and a boy fall.  "We won't die today, girls," she had said to her companions.  "We won't die today."

On 22 July 2011, Anders Behring Breivik killed seventy-seven of his fellow Norwegians in a terrorist atrocity that shocked the world.  Many were teenagers, just beginning their adult lives.  In the devastating aftermath, the inevitable questions began.

How could this happen?  Why did it happen?  And who was Anders Breivik?

Åsne Seierstad was uniquely placed to explore these questions.  An award-winning foreign correspondent, she had spent years writing about people caught up in violent conflict.  Now, for the first time, she was being asked to write about her home country.

Based on extensive testimonies and interviews, One of Us is the definitive account of the massacres and the subsequent trial.  More than that, it is the compelling story of Anders Breivik and a select group of his victims.  A picture emerges of a killer - isolated, awkward, with a strange and troubled childhood.

And on the other side, we come to know fascinating, dazzling young people such as Simon Sæbø and Bano Rashid, eager to contribute to their society.  As we follow the path to their inevitable collision, it becomes clear just what was lost in that one day.

After his trial which began on 16 April 2012 and ended with closing arguments on 22 June 2012, the Oslo District Court issued findings that Breivik was sane, accountable for his actions and guilty of murdering seventy-seven people.  He was sentenced to twenty-one years in prison, in a form of preventive detention that required a minimum of ten years incarceration and the possibility of an extension of that incarceration for as long as he is deemed a danger to society.  This is the maximum penalty in Norway;  he will likely remain in prison for the remainder of his life.

A gripping, shattering and vital book, One of Us is the story of a massacre and a study of evil (and madness).  It is also a story about community versus isolation, hope versus rejection, love versus bigotry and a powerful memorial to those who lost their lives.

One of Us has been translated from the Norwegian to the English by Sarah Death.

About the author:  Åsne Seierstad was born in 1970 and studied Russian, Spanish and History of Philosophy at Oslo University.  An internationally bestselling author, she has also received numerous awards for her journalism.  She worked as a correspondent in Russia between 1993 and 1996 and in China in 1997.  Between 1998 and 2000, she covered the Balkans including the war in Kosovo for Norwegian television.  In 2000, she published her first book, With their Backs to the World:  Portraits from Serbia.

After 11 September 2001, she went to Afghanistan, reporting for a number of major Scandinavian newspapers.  The following year, she went back to live with an Afghan family and wrote The Bookseller of Kabul, which was first published in English in 2003.  It became an international bestseller, selling over two million copies.  The paperback edition remained in the Sunday Times top ten for over a year.  In spring 2003, Åsne Seierstad reported on the war in Iraq from Baghdad and later released A Hundred and One Days:  A Baghdad Journal.  In 2009, she wrote her critically acclaimed book about life in Chechnya, The Angel of Grozny.

Following the atrocities in Oslo and Utøya in July 2011, she attended the trial of Anders Breivik and wrote several articles about the atrocities and their aftermath for Norwegian and international newspapers.  She then began work on One of Us, which became a European bestseller.