CAMILLA LÄCKBERG

Before Camilla Läckberg’s debut novel was published, the Swedish author devised an ambitious, yet workable marketing plan. Among other things, she would visit, if possible, every bookstore in the country to do book events, sign stock and meet and greet as many booksellers and readers as she could.

- Oline H. Cogdill

Coming up with a strategy for bookselling was just business as usual for Läckberg, who had a successful career as an economist before becoming a full-time writer. And her marketing plan paid off.

Her 2003 debut The Ice Princess, which introduced police detective Patrik Hedström and true-crime writer Erica Falck, who live in the small fishing community of Fjällbacka, soon became a bestseller in Sweden, eventually selling nearly 2.6 million copies on the international market. Titled Isprinsessan in Swedish, The Ice Princess set her on the path to becoming one of Sweden’s most popular authors with more than 23 million copies of her now 11 novels sold in over 60 countries.

Her 11th novel, The Golden Cage—the first of a projected two-book series—has just been released in the United States, after being released in April in Europe.

Läckberg always wanted to be an author and showed an aptitude for writing and storytelling as a child. She wrote her first book at age four—Tomten (translated as The Santa Claus), but this was no bright and light merry Christmas tale. Instead, the story, she stated on her website, “was a thrilling and bloodthirsty tale, showing a fascination with the darker sides of humanity even at such an early age.”

She considered writing to be “a rock star dream,” she took a more traditional approach to earn a living. She received a degree in economics from the Gothenburg School of Business, Economics, and Law at the University of Gothenburg, and then moved to Stockholm where she worked for five years as a product manager in marketing for two major telecommunication companies.