Norway mass shooting explored by war zone reporter

On July 22, 2011, Norwegian journalist Asne Seierstad was hoping to relax and unwind in her home country.

Seierstad is best known for capturing the intimacy of everyday life in some of the world's toughest environments through her work as a war correspondent in books like The Bookseller of Kabul and The Angel of Grozny.

But on July 22, 2011, Anders Breivik set off a bomb in central Oslo, just outside the Norwegian prime minister's office, killing eight people, and then drove to the island of Utoya, where he killed another 69 most of whom were teenagers, at a summer camp for Norway's Labour Party

The story of what happened that day is told in almost unbearable detail in Seierstad's latest book, One of Us.

She was in Vancouver on Tuesday to speak at the Vancouver International Writer's Festival, but first, she joined On The Coast host Stephen Quinn for an interview about July 22, her book and what's changed in Norway since that day.

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As someone who had spent time in some of the most terrifying parts of the world, how did you personally feel about what was happening, stepping away from your role as a journalist?

For most Norwegians, I think it was a shock, and then it was a deep sense of grief that came instantly the next day when we saw all the faces.

The median age was 18, but some were as young as 14. It was not just a random school killing; they were killed for what they believed in, because they were members of the Labour Party youth.

This was not my story; I was going back to Libya to cover the fall of Ghadaffi.

This was my hometown, and I was griefstruck as everyone else. Only when I was asked to cover the trial nine months later and I was only supposed to cover the start but once I got into the courtroom, saw the perpetrator, heard his voice, saw the victims, the survivors, I just realized that I had to dig deeper into this.

I had to find out what happened.

What was it about Breivik himself that made you feel that way?

He has a cool attitude. There's something almost freezing about him. He was my neighbour, actually. We lived on the same street before he moved in with his mother. We went to the same gym.

I realized we probably went to some of the same places. He was one of us. He lived among us. I thought it was important to find out where he came from, why he did it, but also to have the other portrait, of the young people.

They all wanted to change Norway. One through violence, and the other ones through small steps that you take in a democracy.

The teenagers, who were there and died because of their political ideas, do you think they've been forgotten in all of this?

They were forgotten, I think, and I'm trying to find out why. I think one reason is this was so painful. It's out of how we want to see ourselves.

It was hidden under the carpet in a way. It's something, that somehow, has been forgotten in Norway.

You tell the story of the murders on the island in horrifying, painstaking detail

I was afraid that it would be too detailed. It's filled with blood. It's filled with skulls being ripped apart. The one important thing is that no parents should be hurt. And I sent the text to all parents to see if they accepted it, and they didn't change anything. Not a drop of blood, nothing.

I just had to document every single killing. Not in detail, but at least in groups. No one is forgotten. But the worst part was sending these excerpts to parents whose kids I hadn't mentioned until the 22nd of July.

Those kinds of passages were hard to send, saying, "I'm only interested in your child at the moment of his or her death." That felt cruel, but it ended up they all accepted it.

The pain is there all the time, anyway. It's not the description of the death of their child that will make things worse.

Why doesn't Norway do more to remember this or commemorate this?

It's difficult. It's political in a way. There would be different analyses whether you're on the left or right. If you're right-wing, you're more prone to say he was crazy.

There's something wrong with him. Whereas if you're on the left you're more likely to say he acted on his own, but he was part of a trend atrend of extremism, of fascism and Islamophobia ... because his goal was to get rid of Muslims.

What we're starting to come to terms with is that these were political murders. And they should be commemorated.

This interview has been condensed and edited. To hear the full interview, click on the audio labelled:2011 Norway massacre explored by war zone reporter