SNEAK PEEK: An Introduction to 'Thorfinn Grimm: Year One'

Plus, a quick update on pre-orders.

Hello dear reader,

It’s been four days since my upcoming book, Thorfinn Grimm: Year One, became available for pre-orders. In that time, four pre-orders have been placed and many of you have also added it to your lists/shared the link. Many, many thanks to all of you for your support. Today, I’ll be sharing the introduction that I wrote for the book.

But first, a reminder: Thorfinn Grimm: Year One will be released as a paperback and e-book on Amazon on November 1, 2024, and here’s the link to pre-order the Kindle edition.

With that out of the way, I present to you the Introduction to the book:

I was raised on mystery. Like many children, my lifelong love of literature began with the Secret Seven, the Five Find-Outers, and the Famous Five. These stories were the spark, but it was Sherlock Holmes who fanned the flames into a roaring inferno. Eventually, I also discovered other great detectives, from Hercule Poirot to C. Auguste Dupin. But Holmes was the first to impress upon me that even the most convoluted mysteries could have a simple solution, and that solution could be discovered through the application of intellect and reason. How different would my life have been if it wasn’t for that great man and his devoted biographer? I shudder at the thought.

I suppose it was inevitable that I would try to create my own Holmes, and I did, many times over. Most of those attempts never saw the light of day, and even with the ones that did, I was always aware that there was something missing. The solution to this problem didn’t come to me through the application of intellect and reason — in fact, I’m not quite sure where it came from — but solve it I did. Sure, Holmes, Poirot, Marple, these are all great characters with great minds who live great lives. However, what if there was a detective of equal calibre but whose life is significantly more difficult? A reluctant hero for whom mystery-solving may be as easy as breathing, but each fresh breath is as difficult as it is for the rest of us? A consulting detective for the 21st century, with all the anxieties of our common existence, who solves cases not out of a sense of morality or intellectual superiority but because he needs to pay the rent. And so, I met Thorfinn Grimm.

One thing you should probably know is that the city Thorfinn lives in, the one that forms the backdrop to most of these cases, is not a real place. While I did use London and New York as the inspirations for this setting, I’ve tried to keep the details of the place intentionally vague. This ties back to my desire that Thorfinn and his stories should be as universal as possible, unbound by geography or culture.

Again, I must repeat, none of this was planned. The first Thorfinn story I wrote had none of these themes or details. For that matter, I didn’t even give him a name back then. It started with a simple idea to write a grounded detective story with a touch of Addams Family-esque humour. At the time, I had no intention of developing this character any further. I posted the story on my Substack newsletter, not expecting any real response. That could have been the end of it, and yet…

Something about him struck a chord and I found myself wanting to explore this character more. Before, I’d always written stories with extensive planning, plotting out every little detail before putting the first word down. Thorfinn, however, was grown organically over time, in a truly chaotic and creative way. I found myself writing more and more of his adventures, each adding another piece to the puzzle, and published those stories online week by week. I gave him family and friends, goals and dreams. And after about half a dozen posts, I finally felt like I knew this unfortunate creation of mine. His struggles — his curse — felt like a mirror of my own, and I was surprised to find that I’d grown to love him just as much as I loved the great detectives that I grew up idolizing. I hope you will too.

In this collection, you will find six cases of mystery and humour drawn from those initial haphazard stories, originally published as The Accursed Adventures of Thorfinn Grimm. These range from simple puzzles to twisted conundrums with multiple moving parts. But irrespective of the size or complexity of the crime, you can be sure that Finn will find the solution. He might not like it, but he will. And I hope that, in his own way, he might just inspire you to find the solutions to your own problems, no matter how strange, overwhelming, or confusing they may be.

Sincerely yours,
Remus Noronha

PS. Before I leave you, I was wondering if you would be okay with receiving more frequent emails with updates about the book and other projects I have on the way. I don’t want to be too intrusive so it’s important to me that I know how you would feel about this. I promise I will return to posting more fiction as soon as I get some creative space and energy.