Norwegian crime writer Jo Nesbø likes a challenge—and whatever he does, he goes all in. A leading voice of Nordic noir, Nesbø is the author of the Harry Hole detective novels, one of the world’s bestselling crime series, as well as nine previous standalone thrillers. He’s also the lead singer of Di Derre, one of Norway’s most popular bands; showrunner of an upcoming Netflix series about Harry Hole; an accomplished rock climber who has climbed in 20 countries; and a philanthropist whose charitable foundation has donated millions of dollars to promote literacy in developing countries.
“I’m always working on something, but I don’t prioritize writing,” Nesbø says over Zoom from the Greek island of Kalymnos. Though his apartment there offers views of the Aegean Sea, it’s not his preferred writing spot. “My favorite place to write is the airport,” he says. “Airports have good coffee, and it’s the right kind of bustle. I have the feeling that I’m doing two things at once.”
Nesbø is the most commercially successful writer in Norway’s history. His novels have sold 60 million copies worldwide, according to his publisher, Knopf, and have been translated into 51 languages. The author hit the literary scene in 1997 with The Bat, which introduced readers to Harry Hole, an antihero detective with an alcohol problem. (Killing Moon, the 13th installment in the series, published in English in 2023.) Nesbø’s books draw from American hard-boiled detective stories and Scandinavian crime fiction, such as Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö’s Martin Beck series from the 1960s and ’70s, which helped establish the Nordic noir genre. Nesbø is also the creator of Doctor Proctor’s Fart Powder, a middle grade series that abounds with whimsy and serves as a reminder that Norway’s top crime writer doesn’t take himself too seriously.
Nesbø’s new thriller, Wolf Hour—translated by Robert Ferguson and out in February from Knopf—is his 10th standalone novel and his first book set exclusively in the United States. It follows Bob Oz, a detective in the Minneapolis Police Department who’s tracking a sniper wanted for shooting an arms dealer from a high-rise building. When the sniper strikes again, Oz realizes that he’s dealing with a serial killer, and that the killer’s victims may be connected. Nesbø presents the story from multiple perspectives, including those of Oz; the sniper, who silently stalks his prey; and a writer from Norway who’s composing a book about the case. The reader is left guessing about who the killer is and why he’s out for blood until the final pages.
Setting a novel in the U.S. was, Nesbø says, one of his longtime goals. His grandparents moved from Norway to New York after they married, and Nesbø’s father was born in Brooklyn, where he lived until the family returned to Norway when he was 12. In 2022, Nesbø visited Minneapolis—which has a substantial Norwegian American population—to research Wolf Hour. He walked the streets and tried to get into the head of his sniper character, and at one point asked a group of nurses if it would be possible to get on the roof of one of the nearby buildings. “I told them I’m writing about this guy who needs to get up on the roof and shoot somebody,” Nesbø recalls with amusement. “The nurses phoned the police, who came looking for me. They got the registration of my car. I almost ended up in jail.”
Jennifer Barth, Nesbø’s editor, praises the author for his willingness to push himself for every book. “Jo doesn’t do anything halfway,” she says. “He’s intense and a great craftsman, and he never runs out of ideas.”
Nesbø was born in Oslo in 1960 and raised in Molde, on Norway’s west coast. His father, a lifelong reader, introduced him to The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, which remains one of Nesbø’s favorite books. Growing up, he invented stories to entertain himself and picked unlikely friends. “I was usually the only friend of the most unpopular kid—the know-it-all,” Nesbø says. “I found those characters fascinating because they didn’t need friends. I was always drawn to people who don’t care what others think.”
In his late teens, Nesbø played semiprofessional soccer for the Norwegian team Molde FK until an injury ended his athletic career. He then studied at the Norwegian School of Economics, where he earned his degree in 1986. He was working in finance in 1992 when he formed Di Derre, whose music soon topped the Norwegian charts. In 1996, burned-out from juggling his finance and music careers, he went to Australia, where he wrote a draft of The Bat in five weeks. In Det. Harry Hole he found a kindred spirit. “We’re both cynical and romantic, and we’re loners,” he says. “Everybody needs time alone, but I need it to a greater extent than most people.”
Niclas Salomonsson, Nesbø’s agent, began representing the author in 2005. “When Jo’s first novel was published in Swedish, I was blown away,” says Salomonsson, who’s based in Stockholm. “It was like watching a movie. I thought, he’s too good not to be discovered internationally in a wider way.”
Salomonsson worked to expand Nesbø’s audience. “It’s been an incredible journey,” he says. “Jo is the most fascinating man I’ve ever met.” Salomonsson recalls that, some years ago, when a foreign publisher wanted to buy Nesbø a gift after a particularly lucrative sales year, the author requested a simple backpack for rock climbing, then found one himself, on sale, and put it on hold for the publisher.
“He’s never changed,” Salomonsson says. “He’s driven by the joy of storytelling.”
Nesbø, who has a 26-year-old daughter, says he never wants to get too comfortable in life. When he turned 50, he began seriously devoting himself to rock climbing as a way to challenge himself. “Climbing didn’t come easily,” Nesbø says. “I’m afraid of heights. I had to fight to do it. It was mind expanding.”
He keeps pushing himself creatively, as well. Sylvie Rabineau, Nesbø’s film and TV co-agent, notes that he’s become a trusted name in Hollywood, with several projects in development, including a film adaptation of his novel Blood on Snow, directed by Cary Joji Fukunaga, which he cowrote, and an adaptation of Wolf Hour. Nesbø is currently in post-production on the Netflix crime drama series Jo Nesbø’s Detective Hole, which he co-created.
“Show-running is hard,” Nesbø says. “There are days when you’re on top of the world, and days when you wish you’d never started, but it’s been a great experience.”
Nesbø excels at many things, but writing novels remains his passion. He compares himself to a ship captain—guiding the way, especially when the waters turn dark. “I know exactly where I’m taking you,” he says. “You just enjoy the ride.”
Elaine Szewczyk’s writing has appeared in McSweeney’s and other publications. She’s the author of the novel I’m with Stupid.
