> Skip to content
  • Published: 10 May 2011
  • ISBN: 9781446483480
  • Imprint: Vintage Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 208

Camera



'Liffner's distillation of old evils and new insight is evocative, potent and memorable...her book is original, unsettling and quite brilliant' - Literary Review

On her uncle Jacob's death Johanna discovers a mysterious box of photographs amongst his belongings. Inspired to investigate Jacob's early life in London, where he trained as a photographer, she uncovers a macabre history laced with scandal.

In 1905, Jacob is apprenticed to Herbert Burrows who photographs the séances of the Theosophist Society. Among the members of the society is Reverend Charles Leadbetter, who also employs Burrows for an altogether more sinister task. Intrigued by the possibilities of photography, Leadbetter secretly uses young children in experiments to capture the soul on film as it leaves the body. When Leadbetter's scheme is discovered it leads to further deceit and murder.

The true story is gradually pieced together from Johanna's research and Jacob's own account, leading to a chilling discovery in the Thames...

Camera won The Swedish Detective Novel Academy Award for First Novel, the Poloni Prize for female crime writers and the Flint Axe prize for the best historical crime novel.

  • Published: 10 May 2011
  • ISBN: 9781446483480
  • Imprint: Vintage Digital
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 208

About the author

Eva-Marie Liffner

Eva-Marie Liffner was born in Gothenburg, Sweden in 1957. After studying, among other things, archaeology and the history of ideas, she became a journalist, later deciding to write fiction. Her first novel, Camera, was awarded four Swedish literary prizes, among them the Flint Axe for the best historical crime novel of 2001. Imago, Liffner's second novel, was nominated for the August Prize 2003.

Also by Eva-Marie Liffner

See all

Praise for Camera

A skilfully designed crime story-quotes from letters and newspaper articles are intertwined with other narrative techniques in a remarkably daring but assured way

Dagens Nyheter

A vivid and increasingly fascinating recreation of the past and is human dramas

Svenska Dagbladet

Reminiscent of Louise Welsh's The Cutting Room, Camera also contains elements of Sinclairian psychogeography and... this narrative jigsaw shakes down in satisfying style

Observer