Postcard

The first two books in her trilogy about life in a very small town in Northern Sweden. The drama creeps under your skin and I never wanted to stop reading while I was at it.

Mrs Dalloway is iconic in tone and voice. The entire book spans over one day in the life of the main character and although there does not seem to be much drama, it all goes on on the inside.

In a Room of One’s Own she sets out the premise for female independence.

PAUL AUSTER, 4-3-2-1
I have read pretty much everything by Siri Hustvedt, and when her husband Paul Auster dyed in February this year it made me curious of this great American writer. So I have spent the Summer listening to him on audio books. 4321 is indeed a wonderful masterpiece about love and the modern life in America in the 20th century. Right now I am going through his New York Triology. 

HARUKI MURAKAMI, NORWEGIAN WOOD
I read Haruki Murakami’s Norwegian Wood this summer and fell in love with Murakami all again. He is the kind of writer where you can consume one or two of his books at a time.

EVELYN McDONNELL, THE WORLD ACCORDING TO JOAN DIDION
I recommend anything by Joan Didion including the documentary on her running on Netflix called “The center will not hold”. And the book about her as a writer by Evelyn McDonnell is also quite interesting, although it is fan girling a bit too much at times.

SATOSHI YAGISAWA, DAYS AT THE MORISAKI BOOKSHOP
Days at the Morisaki Bookshop is a wonderful little read that stays with you. I made me dream of going to Japan once again.

VITA FAVOURITES:
The first edition of Vita Andersen’s debut collection of poems “Tryghedsnarkomaner” from 1977 sold out in 10 minutes and ended up selling more than 100.000 copies which is a lot for a small country like Denmark. It depicted the life and mind of a woman in a way that had never been seen before. And as with all great litterature it is still relevant reading today. She was a productive writer but here are some of the favourites:

READ:
I loved “The Parisienne” by Isabella Hammad and am taken with my first reading of “Enter Ghostwriter,” her latest book. Isabella Hammad is aBristish Palestinian and the story is set in Haifa so it is a strangely relevant read.

READ:
I’m bringing Edmund De Waal’s Letters to Comodo. I loved his The hare with amber eyes and I think that we all have an obligation to educate ourselves. Especially at a time when understanding current affairs takes knowing our past. So I am reading yet another book on the systematic anti-semitism that has saturated European society for centuries.

READ:
Still have Stockholm on my mind so Doctor Glas set in the Swedish capital is the perfect autumn read. It was first published in 1905 but is surprisingly modern. Interesting how we often think of ourselves as “modern” yet it often turns out the the people of our past were much more radical.

EAT:
I am in the mood for cooking this weekend and I will be getting my inspiration from the new cook book by the women behind Easy Peacy.

I love books I can sink my teeth into so Fatma Aydemir’s Ånder or “Djinns” in German seems perfect for now. When you want to remember what slow days feel like, but the pace is picking up, this is what you want to go to.

I have started reading Goliarda Sapienza’s “The art of Joy”, and my plan is to read it in the shade of a blooming tree in the garden.

Mrs Dalloway is perhaps Virginia Woolf’s most important book showing the inner world of the female mind. This version by Vintage Classics is coming with me to my country home this summer.

Joan Didion is perhaps best known for her masterpiece A year of magical thinking which is one of the very best things I have ever read. Blue Night is also breathtakingly brilliant. I also really like Telling stories from Let me tell you what I mean about her method of writing. I love her language and how she makes me think.

Recently I reread Joan Didion’s A year of magical thinking. Last time I read it was over a decade ago, and I urge everyone to read it. Her honest voice touched me more that I can say.

I was given this beautiful book by a wonderful and tres chic lady in Stockholm who subscribes to my Postcard and shares my love of books. She thought I would like Small Things Like These, and I will be reading it during the Easter Holidays.

Anne Berest’s The Postcard is a gruesome and important read about life in the 20th and 21st Century as a European Jew. So well written it opens minds and becomes part of the reader.

“Our missing hearts” by Celeste Ng was an unusual read for me as it is set in the future in a parallel world. Normally I don’t like futuristic novels but this one has a captivating and relevant storyline that got to me. It made my first week of January better.

I have been getting a lot of credit lately for my book recommendations, which I am actually really proud of. However, I just started Tolstoy´s “War and peace” which is a good 2000 pages, so it will be a while, before I will be on to the next book. Wish me luck. 

Annie Ernaux’s “Simple Passion” is small in size but raw in its impact. Easily read in a day or two, however, I have never had a book in my hands that explained what passion is and what passion does in such an unsentimental way. This one I love.

I must be the only Scandinavian who hasn’t read Karl Ove Knausgård. I didn’t think he was for me, but I was wrong. “Ulvene fra Evighedens Skov” is such a beautiful story that I will highly recommend it although I haven’t quite finished it yet. If you need a good read for your Autumn break, bring it along. 

If Knausgård is too massive a book, I would opt for Yoko Tawada who writes slender accounts of alienation. It fits into your Anemone Bag, and she had me at “hello.” The first line goes like this: “According to my grandmother travelling meant drinking unknown water. Different places, different water.” Love it. 

Watch "The Hours" and read "Mrs Dalloway" at the same time. By coincidence I did that last week and it was a brilliant experience. I had read the book in my teens and seen the film when it came out. But it gave an extra dimension enjoying the two simultaneously. 

Heaven is a rainy day spent in an English bookstore. I was late to reading Edmund de Waal’s amazing “The hare with amber eyes” but I will be quick to reading his third book “Letters to Comodo” that has recently been published. Here are a few of the titles that I have picked up in Waterstones.

This summer I stubled across Deborah Levy’s books in my favourite Blackwell’s Bookshop in Oxford. Since then I have read all her books, but I particularly loved her autobiography trilogy: “Things I don’t want to know”, “The cost of living” and “Real estate.” They made such a difference to me when I read them, and they come with my highest recommendation. She is a brilliant author.

I am reading “Fresh water for flowers” by Valérie Perrin right now, and if you don’t know what to bring on your holidays, then this is the one. It is wonderful.

Magazines are struggling for a reason. Not only are the social medias making it difficult for them to hold on to a form of relevance, however, they are often editorials shadows of their former selves. The Luncheon is an exception. It is exceptionally well done.

I will spend a lot of time gardening and reading the next couple of weeks. I should have read this one book at a time a long time ago, but now they are all three gathered into one book: I will start tonight.   

I read a lot, but I was late to start reading “Where the crawdads sing”, (“Hvor flodkrebsene synger”) however, if you haven’t read it yet then do yourself a favour and find the time. It is the best book I have read this year. For the Easter Holidays I am packing winner of the Nobel Price in literature Abdulrazak’s “Paradise” and Tove Jansson’s “Rejse med let bagage”. 

Annie Ernaux: Årene, Les années, The Years. It is a modern masterpiece of a book.

How to spend it. Growing up in England has given me a great love of English newspapers and especially the weekend supplements. Financial Time’s “How to Spend it” the European edition, is very good indeed and a subscription is on my Christmas wish list.