After a long career in publishing, both in Denmark and Iceland, Snaebjorn Arngrimsson (b.1961) sat down to write a story for children and adolescents. It was his dream to create a mystery adventure for kids, a story that would keep its readers so totally spellbound, drawing them in with such irresistible force, that their minds would have space for nothing else in the whole universe apart from the world of the story. This was the first book about Milla and Gudjon G. Georgsson, The Secrets of the Abandoned House, which won the Icelandic Children’s Literature Prize in 2019 and was nominated for the Icelandic Bookseller’s Prize as the best children’s book of 2019.

The sequel, The Mysterious Statue and the Boy who Disappeared, won the 2020 Reykjavik Children’s Literature Prize and was selected as one of the Best Children’s Books 2020, by Frettabladid daily. The third title in the series is the Gold Digger’s Handbook, published in 2021.