Author: Åsne Seierstad

Seierstad was born in Oslo, but grew up in Lillehammer, Norway to “a feminist author mother”, Lector Frøydis Guldahl, and “a leftist politician father”, Assistant Professor Dag Seierstad (b. 1936). She holds a bachelor’s degree from the University of Oslo where she majored in Russian, Spanish and history of ideas. From 1993 until 1996 she reported for the Arbeiderbladet in Russia and in 1997 from China. From 1998 until 2000 she worked for the national public broadcaster NRK where she reported from the Serbian breakaway province of Kosovo. With Their Backs to The World: Portraits of Serbia, her first book, is an account of this time. (This book was extended and republished in 2004 when she again visited Serbia. The name was changed slightly, to Portraits of Serbia, signaling that Serbia’s back is no longer turned to the world.).

As a reporter she is particularly remembered for her work in war zones such as Afghanistan, Iraq and most recently Chechnya, as well as for her reports on the September 11 attacks in the United States of America. The Bookseller of Kabul, her second, bestselling book, is an account of the time she spent living with an Afghan family in Kabul after the fall of the Taliban in 2001. Her other books include One Hundred And One Days: A Baghdad Journal which describes the three months she spent in Iraq in the build-up to the U.S.-led invasion in 2003, Angel of Grozny: Inside Chechnya, an account of the time she spent in Chechnya after the war, and One of Us: The Story of Anders Breveik and the Massacre in Norway (2015).

Seierstad is completely fluent in five languages, and has “a good working knowledge” of another four. She currently lives and works in Oslo.

She has two children with the Norwegian jazz musician and composer Trygve Seim (b. 1971).

One of Us: The Story of Anders Breivik and the Massacre in Norway

One of Us: The Story of Anders Breivik and the Massacre in Norway

One of Us: The Story of Anders Breivik and the Massacre in Norway by Åsne Seierstad
on April 21st 2015
Pages: 544
See it @ Goodreads


Synopsis

A harrowing and thorough account of the massacre that upended Norway, and the trial that helped put the country back together
On July 22, 2011, Anders Behring Breivik detonated a bomb outside government buildings in central Oslo, killing eight people. He then proceeded to a youth camp on the island of Utøya, where he killed sixty-nine more, most of them teenage members of Norway’s governing Labour Party. In One of Us, the journalist Åsne Seierstad tells the story of this terrible day and what led up to it. What made Breivik, a gifted child from an affluent neighborhood in Oslo, become a terrorist?
As in her bestseller The Bookseller of Kabul, Seierstad excels at the vivid portraiture of lives under stress. She delves deep into Breivik’s troubled childhood, showing how a hip-hop and graffiti aficionado became a right-wing activist and Internet game addict, and then an entrepreneur, Freemason, and self-styled master warrior who sought to “save Norway” from the threat of Islam and multiculturalism. She writes with equal intimacy about Breivik’s victims, tracing their political awakenings, aspirations to improve their country, and ill-fated journeys to the island. By the time Seierstad reaches Utøya, we know both the killer and those he will kill. We have also gotten to know an entire country—famously peaceful and prosperous, and utterly incapable of protecting its youth.

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One of Us presents a detailed account of Anders Breivik life and how he came to massacre 79 people. From his sad childhood until his total break with reality Anders Breivik devised a terrible plot against his country because he opposed the immigration happening in Norway.  What struck me most about this story was how totally unprepared the Norwegian government was for this type of attack.

Was Anders Breivik a homegrown terrorist or raving manic? I think he was not working with a full deck.  With a growing concern in the United States about immigration, One of Us is a timely read.

MICHEL MARTIN, host: Now to an issue that’s been on many of our minds since that tragic attack in Norway last week. Anders Behring Breivik confessed to the attacks that left more than 70 people dead. He said that he believes Europe is at war with Islam and his actions were necessary. Breivik’s lawyer, Geir Lippestad, spoke today at a press conference.

Additional reviews:
New York Times
Telegraph