Reviews
Curated and edited by Darcy Hurford
REVIEW
D e kroniskt
Under the piercing, watchful eye of the main character Anne in Carolina Ringskog Ferrada-Noli’s wildly entertaining and, at the same time, crushing novel It Is Chronic, the ways of today’s (western) world are picked apart and observed through the lens of pain.
REVIEW
Hjärtat i källaren
What would you do if you found a beating beetroot heart in the basement? Micaela Favilla’s The Heart in the Cellar offers one possibility.
REVIEW
Satansviskningar
What is evil, and how does it relate to who we are? Is the desert the setting of Sami Said's thematically heavy, yet lyrically light novel, or is it the emotional world itself? There is life in every corner, but is the desert chiefly pregnant with miracles, or evil?
REVIEW
Fattigt Skryt
With its appealingly coloured tales of a group of twenty-something friends that shun strict realism for a more psychological take, Cecilia Vårhed’s graphic novel Empty Boasting has fun with the genre.
REVIEW
Mitt stora vackra hat. En biografi över Victoria Benedictsson.
Elisabeth Åsbrink's My Big, Beautiful Hatred portrays a gifted writer torn apart by the conflicting demands that late nineteenth-century society placed on female authors and intellectuals.
REVIEW
En bra plats i skallen
The phrase: ‘sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll’, can be used to describe many works of fiction and non-fiction written on the subject of popular music in the last 60 or so years. Marcus Berggren’s book, A Good Place in the Brain, is certainly one of these, and to which can be added the phrase, ‘with a wry sense of humour.’
REVIEW
Stacken
In Annika Norlin’s debut novel The Ant Hill, An alternative lifestyle brings rewards and challenges for a group of people who reject mainstream society.
REVIEW
Onsdagar på badhuset
Alma Thörn’s children’s book Wednesdays at the Swimming Pool is a lavishly illustrated and irresistibly empathetic tale of what it feels like to struggle with anxiety.
REVIEW
Den ömma modern
Karin Nordin Stensö's The Tender Mother is a graphic memoir about becoming a mother and struggling with the reality of it, as compared to the way it is depicted in art.
REVIEW
Fjollornas fest
In Sissy, Jonas Gardell writes another collective literary testimony from Stockholm’s gay community. This time, the sissies – said to be the most despised even by the gay community – take centre stage.
REVIEW
Själens telegraf
Does honesty matter? In Soul’s Telegraph, Amanda Svensson explores the painful legacy of a mother who can’t – or won’t – tell the truth.
REVIEW
Onkalo
In his award-winning poetry collection, Onkalo, Victor von Hellens depicts the solitary existence of an isolated individual in a post-apocalyptic Finland.
REVIEW
Himlen nära. Stig Dagerman och Anita Björk.
Heaven is Near is an exploration of the art, love and enduring legacies of Swedish writer Stig Dagerman and actress Anita Björk, written by their daughter, Lo Dagerman
REVIEW
Moral
If you partake in something you know is wrong and later write about it, can any value be extracted from the prose? Or is it simply wrong? August Prize-nominated Morality by Lyra Ekström Lindbäck unfolds like a thesis centred on this and other philosophical questions.
REVIEW
Skotten i Slovakien. En centraleuropeisk tragedi
Whatever happened to memory in the former dictatorships of Central Europe? Shots in Slovakia: A Central European Tragedy highlights the shortcomings in remembrance culture that continue to hold these societies back.
REVIEW
Höken sjunger om död
Murder in academia: The Hawk Sings of Death is a literary crime novel set at Uppsala University by an author based there.
REVIEW
Omsorgslabyrinten
A curator’s eye tour of an art museum, The Maintenance Labyrinth, Ida Börjel’s dialogue in poem form is narrated with an eye for the details of objects and their conservation, as well as subtle humour.
REVIEW
Portal
Edith Hammar's Portal is a queer graphic novel about finding community and being seen.