This is a first-person mystery set in the 1990s in Denmark, Greenland and the seas between. Smilla is a 30ish half-inuit woman who is unhappy with the authorities' apparent disinterest in the death of a inuit boy. She sets out to find out what's really going on, and a fairly unremarkable mystery unfolds. The catch is that the author spends time on kinds and behaviors of ice and snow. Mixed with the unusual settings and characters, this is enough to make the book worthwhile. My sense is that the translation is fine; it's the writing itself which is only fair.