[2] He made his publishing debut in 2009 with the book Cruelty: The executed in Norway 1815–1876 (Norwegian: Ondskap: De henrettede i Norge 1815–1876),[3] which deals in detail with every case of capital punishment in the period 1815–1876, fellow crime author and historian Hans Olav Lahlum called it "a masterpiece".
[2] He has been noted for bringing the view of a clinician when regarding the anatomical methodology and the art and technique of the classical executions.
[6] In October 2010, Sørnes was called in to investigate when startled construction workers in Åsnes uncovered centuries-old human remains at their building site.
[7] Sørnes quickly determined it to be the remains of an 18th-century female, condemned child-murderer Anna Østmo, who was executed for murdering her two infant children in 1784.
[10] A similar incident occurred in October 2011 in Stavern when workers uncovered another set of mysterious skeletal human remains, which again turned out to be centuries old.