The Last Pilgrim

Young, lovely Norwegian Agnes Gerner is waging a dangerous and secret fight. Outwardly, she is a devoted Nazi sympathizer engaged to a prominent businessman. In fact, she is part of an underground resistance doing everything to win the war against the Germans. The only hope she has of being reunited with the man she truly loves—who serves under the code name “Pilgrim”—is if the Nazis are defeated. Of course, there’s no guarantee that she’ll be alive when that happens…

Many years later, three sets of remains are found in a popular Oslo forest—two adults and a child. Despite his boss’s call to not spend extra time on the old case, Detective Tommy Bergmann cannot help but dig deeper, especially as he uncovers connections to a more recent murder. As he unravels the secrets of the past, it becomes clear that everything is permissible in war—and that only those who reject love can come out victorious.

Gard Sveen is an award-winning crime novelist who divides his time between writing and working as a senior adviser to the Norwegian Ministry of Defense. The Last Pilgrim, his debut novel, was originally published as Den siste pilgrimen in Norway and is the first in the series featuring troubled police detective Tommy Bergmann.

The novel was an instant hit with critics and readers, and it went on to win the Riverton Prize in 2013, the prestigious Glass Key in 2014, and the Maurits Hansen Award, also in 2014. Sveen is the only author to date who has received all three honors for a first novel. The only other author who has managed to win both a Riverton and a Glass Key for their debut novel is Jo Nesbø.

Sveen is currently working on his third book in the Tommy Bergmann Series.