Book talk: Professor Andersen’s Night

Award-winning Norwegian novelist Dag Solstad joins us with author Rebecca Dinerstein for a book talk on his newest novel, an existential murder mystery titled Professor Andersen’s Night.

On Christmas Eve, 55-year-old professor Pål Andersen sits alone in his living room, drinking coffee and cognac and lost in a train of thought, when he glances out the window and sees a man strangling a woman across the street. Paralyzed by indecision, he finds himself unable to call the police or even his friends. Over the night that follows, he instead finds himself obsessing about the murderer’s whereabouts — until he later finds himself face-to-face with the killer himself.

An unsettling yet highly entertaining novel, written in Dag Solstad’s signature concise, dark, and witty prose, Professor Andersen’s Night examines mid-life crisis and social critique in the wake of a senseless tragedy.