Society & Class — The Book Roads

Money to Burn

Asta Olivia Nordenhof

Maggie and Kurt live in an old farmhouse in Nyborg, Denmark, struggling to maintain their marriage after their only daughter leaves home. Although they share a life, they seem unable to reach one another, trapped in a relationship shaped by longing, disappointment, and painful silences. As their story unfolds, the novel explores the circumstances that brought them together and the forces that have gradually shaped their lives. Their personal history intersects with one of Scandinavia’s most devastating tragedies: the 1990 fire aboard the passenger ferry Scandinavian Star, which killed 159 people. The disaster, later linked to insurance fraud, becomes a lens through which Nordenhof examines the relationship between private suffering and wider economic systems. Moving between intimate family drama and a broader critique of capitalism, the novel asks whether love can survive in a world where money determines so much of human existence. With fragmented storytelling and emotionally intense prose, Nordenhof explores how economic inequality, gender, and violence shape intimate relationships. Money to Burn is the first instalment in the Scandinavian Star series, an ambitious literary project connecting individual lives with the consequences of greed and exploitation.

Denmark 2020