HÉLÈNE GULLBERG

 
 

HÉLÈNE GULLBERG has worked as a specialist in works of art at the auction company Bukowski’s, as well as Stockholm Auction House, and is now a superintendent at The Royal Palace in Stockholm. She made her literary debut fall 2020, with the novel “The Preserved Widow” (Historiska Media), a historical novel about love, furniture, art, and women in the Gustavian era.

She has previously contributed to TV shows like “The History Eaters” (SVT) and “The Queens” (TV4), and is a co-writer of the book “Royal Parks – People and Stories” (InPress Art 2019). She is also a popular lecturer who loves to tell stories about history, people, and objects in an engaging way.

In 2023 her debut novel THE PROTÉGÉE was nominated for Best Swedish Debut by The Swedish Academy of Crime Fiction.

Photo Credit: Thron Ullberg

Agent: Erik Larsson

 
 

WORKS

THE PROTÉGÉE

 
 

published bazar, may 2023
GENRE crime
pages 359

RIGHTS SOLD
NORWEGIAN: Gyldendal 1–2
german: dtv 1–2
fINNISH: minerva (wsoy) 1–3
sPANISH: SEIX BARRAL (PLANETA) 
Italian: Neri Pozza
UK (World english): pUSHKIN PRESS


 

Nominated for Best Crime Debut of the Year 2023 by the Swedish Academy of Crime Fiction

There is nothing that Sten Hammar loves more than art and antiquities. Even though his estate Hammarnäs is already filled to the brink with precious items, his appetite for beautiful objects seems insatiable. When Hammar is found murdered on his own property, it is first thought to be the result of a robbery, but the evidence soon points to foul play.  

Highly esteemed auction house Wallius sends Majja Skog – their overly gifted expert of antiquities – to the estate in order to value Sten’s collection.

As an eight-year-old, Majja became Sten Hammar's protégée. He brought her into the world of art and antiquities, turning her into a force of dual nature – a person with a wounded interior and a hard exterior, obsessed with the power that objects hold over us.

Detective Karin Klinga is fascinated by the enigmatic Majja, considering her personality something of a strange mixture of champagne and home-distilled hard liquor. What kind of darkness and memories does she carry with her? And is it possible that she knows more about the murder than she lets on?

THE PROTÉGÉE is the first book in Hélène Gullberg’s new ‘Majja Skog’-series.