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Very strange. Good writing, but often difficult to understand the bigger story. The protagonist was irritating at times. But I think her character development improved

This ticked all the right boxes for me. I don't think I'm very much like Sonja, the main character, and I've certainly made different choices with my life. Still, the way she remembers the wilderness she grew up in and the way she feels somehow separate from everyone were extremely relatable. I read the last page in tears. I loved it.

This was a deep dive into a character that was quirky at times, but always very human and real. A woman in her forties tries to learn to drive. During this time, she thinks on her past when she was an odd child to the time when she is an odd adult. I liked that she didn‘t feel bad about herself, but was accepting of her strangeness. The book is meandering and somewhat plotless, though, which doesn‘t work for me. Good narration. #hoopla 3⭐️

I really enjoyed my first read of 2020. This introspective, mostly plotless novel about a middle aged woman in #Denmark is a sort of melancholy delight. The writing is lovely and the main character‘s loneliness is balanced by her self-awareness. Her reminiscences and musings are in turns witty, poignant, and highly relevant. I appreciate most how relatable it is and how connected I felt to the setting.

#ReadingEurope2020

“Folke‘s leaning over his desk. He‘s a tall man with a bald pate and a striking beard. His face is alive, open, and he‘s made a concerted effort with the beard. From his chin it tapers to a point, but elsewhere it‘s thick and bushy. It‘s as if the hair he once had atop his head has slid down under his chin, where it now points toward his other male hair...” 👇

This short novel in translation was surprisingly funny and deep. Completely devoured this one. #MountTBR

#BookHaul

I‘m a few days late in posting this book haul. The last of the 2018 book buys - a book depository post-Christmas purchase. I‘m on a hiatus from buying (or at least buying more consciously - picking up my book club picks, etc). Focusing on reading down Mount TBR for a while!!

#nofemmeber #debbiedowner
I had absolutely no idea who this character is so had to check on line. So whilst i don't think sonja necessarily fits the bill as Sonja is a middle age woman suffering from anxiety who is learning to drive but i fought I'd just mention it as a book of translated fiction that i really enjoyed this year.

It‘s tough in traffic not to think of death.

Clever, witty & surprising. ✔️
A deep dive into character and emotion. ✔️
Powerful & evocative. ✔️
No real plot. ✔️
Themes of urban isolation, anxiety and longing. ✔️
This novel translated from Danish is definitely my jam. Also, the MC has BPPV, a kind of vertigo I experienced for the first time earlier this year. #WIT

“Your energy field is impaired. You have to let energy in through the crown of your head,” she added, and showed Sonja how to use her hands to form a funnel over her head. The energy was supposed to drip down into Sonja like boiling water through a coffee filter.

…she saw a display of snow globes, big ones. Inside the globes there were castles & landscapes of such majesty such as you would only encounter in America. Sonja stood arrested before the shop window. She laid her forehead against the glass. How her hands yearned to touch the spheres, to take them home, keep them secret in her cabinet. To shake them. Yes, to shake them & ascertain that reality could turn into fairytale with just a little jiggling.

It‘s hard to find clothes to fit the body you have, and it‘s hard to find words to fit the people you love.

Sonja‘s busy editing Gösta, so that the blackbirds he‘s conjured on page 10 don‘t turn into great tits by page 14.
“It‘s also important for a novel that a character have the same name throughout the entire work,” Sonja says. “Unless the name change has something to do with the plot, that is.”

I devoured this book - sooo good.

Swedish author- short book about a translator of Danish crime fiction who has vertigo, no close relationships and is just trying to get her driver‘s license. 3⭐️ this was short listed for the Man Booker International Prize and I usually love those books but this one was flat on story for me.

Next library book up on deck- cannot remember where I heard the recommendation but I put it on hold then and here we are!

This is a curious book which grew on me as i slowly read about Sonja's, a forty something translator of sewdish crime fiction lonely life in Copenhagen as she tries to learn to drive. Saying much about life and its various meanderings i took a lot from this gentle story. Sad but rewarding and i hoped as i put the book down that my take on the end was positive.

She wants to get free, utterly free, and so she has to take flight... Sonja pressed an elevator button in her mind. The doors opened and then Sonja departed skyward. While Jytte was grinding out her first butt under her shoe, Sonja disappeared from the picture unnoticed...

I really liked this. Sonja navigates driving lessons & a lonely life in Copenhagen with a singular outlook, perseverance & dry humour. She‘s not where she is supposed to be, in more ways than one: the book is about her having the will to find herself. I had no expectations, but enjoyed the arthouse sensibility, strong writing & off-beat characters. It‘s not fast-paced, but is original & unsentimental. Amelie Nothomb meets Murakami?

Starting this with a glass of Riesling. 👌📖

I was won over by the blurbs for this book and I generally love everything by Pushkin Press. Also picked up Beloved for #ReadHarder and some books for the kids. #bookhaul #impulsebuy #bookbanfail 📚

I get what the author is trying to do - feature a single woman, approaching middle age, showing her life - but I'm not sure it is successful. Pictured with fish tacos because.

Sonja is the one from #allthesingleladies in the world, dissatisfied with her own life ... but eventually, she finds a way how to #beyourself

#junetunz #junebookbugs

Introspective, quiet novel, atmosphere in the story is very melancholic, but not sentimental and in fairly simple prose, full of metaphors about unfulfilled life of Sonja, aged forty-something. Sonja is a loner, anxious, unhappy in the city, and she is looking for the meaning, connection with the family and the world. Nice, pleasant red, but unfortunately, as a whole – unsatisfying.

I've been waiting for this book for almost two months ... and the longlist for #ManBookerInternationalPrize2017 will be completed ✅

4/5🌟. This is definitely a book for a certain age group. As Sonja tries to come to grips with her current life situation in her 40's, she realizes she has lost her way. Quick and lyrical.

#saturdayread #imbooker2017

#bookmail 🎉📚

Sonja kan ikke rigtigt finde koblingspunktet. Hverken i livet eller i bilen.

En af de bedste danske romaner, som jeg har læst længe.