Barricade Books publisher Lyle Stuart isn't letting current legal and financial w s (thanks to that lawsuit by casino owner Steve Wynn) stop him from getting in on the WWII memoir boom sparked by Saving Private Ryan. This fall he's planning to re-release Report from Number 24, Gunnar Sonsteby's personal account of his derring-do as a Norwegian resistance fighter. The book was originally translated and published by Lyle Stuart Publishing in 1966, but has been out of print for 30 years. Stuart recently bought the reprint rights, again, as has a Norwegian publisher.
While the book was not a bestseller in the U.S. back then, as it was in Norway (where is was on the bestseller list for two years), Stuart has fond memories of the original release. "I remember being on the road with Sonsteby in L.A., waiting for him to show up somewhere. Then he called me up from a Scandia store [the Scandinavian furniture store]. They had recognized him and started to have a party." The dashing Sonsteby is still alive and kicking, and may come over for another tour with his book's rerelease.
And Stuart believes you don't have to hail from Oslo -- or be a Scandia store worker -- to appreciate Sonsteby's book. "It reads like the best thriller novel," he said. Library Journal, in its review of the original release of the book, concurred: "It gives the sense of exposure to danger which is a necessary part of a spy book."
