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Small Comfort
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Expected 30 Jun 26From the successful child actor who has now turned into a failing thief; to an actor hired to give a speech at a stranger's wedding; to a couple feigning married bliss to keep their Small Comfort is a brilliantly original examination of the value of people and money. How do financial structures, such as currency, relate to our own emotional landscapes? What does it really mean to be in debt to someone? And what do we lose when we supposedly win?
304 pages, Paperback
First published March 19, 2018
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2256 people want to read
About the author
Ia Genberg
6 books197 followersIa Gabriella Genberg (born 5 November 1967) is a Swedish journalist and novelist.
Born in Stockholm, Sweden, she debuted as a writer in 2012 with the novel Söta fredag ("Sweet Friday"). Her fourth novel, Detaljerna ("The Details"), won the August Prize in 2022, the year of its publication. The English translation, by Kira Josefsson, was shortlisted for the 2024 International Booker Prize.
Author Picture: Sara Mac Key
Born in Stockholm, Sweden, she debuted as a writer in 2012 with the novel Söta fredag ("Sweet Friday"). Her fourth novel, Detaljerna ("The Details"), won the August Prize in 2022, the year of its publication. The English translation, by Kira Josefsson, was shortlisted for the 2024 International Booker Prize.
Author Picture: Sara Mac Key
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Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Longlisted for the 2026 International Booker Prize
Marriage: there’s always a winner and a loser, one who makes more withdrawals than deposits, one whose investments turn out to be wiser in the long term, who seems to constantly repay their debts right before the interest rate goes up.
Small Comfort is Kira Josefsson's translation of Klen tröst & fyra andra berättelser om pengar by Ia Genberg. The Details from the same translator/author was previously shortlisted for the 2024 edition of the International Booker.
The original full title of Small Comfort could be translated as Small Comfort and Four Other Stories About Money, and the book rather does what it says on the tin, or perhaps better what the signature of the chief cashier says on the bank note.
I’m sure you saw the briefcase on TV, stuffed with globally accepted currency, and maybe you were surprised by the shape of the bills: the cash, their physicality, their potential rustling. Cash and digital money might be the same, but in actuality they aren’t. One is traceable, the other is not–though the real difference is about something else. For instance, the fact that the words for ‘cash’ are more numerous in most languages than the words for ‘darling’, and that these two words activate the same area in the amygdala. Or that the effort a person expends on making money can be enhanced by the physical experience of money, e.g. holding it in one’s hand, or having one’s face being placed in the draught produced by riffling through a wad of notes. Looking at an account statement or a stock exchange chart doesn’t have the same effect: no glands are activated, no salivation occurs, no muscles contract. Cash, on the other hand, like a strong scent from one’s childhood, takes the fast lane to the human heart.
Although these are more 5 novellas than 5 short stories - and all 5 outstayed their welcome for me, although the different formats adopted does maintain the reader's interest for the overall project. And there are links between them - some clear, other more subtle, and I suspect some too subtle for my attention span.
Success Greger has a reporter (called Ia Genberg) interviewing a former child actor Greger Johnson who, years ago, appeared in a movie based on Astrid Lindgren's Emil i Lönneberga books - the story a recording of their interview. The reporter is interviewing various of the stars of the film for a tribute to the director, who has died, but Greger is more interested in both theorising on life and telling her how he impulsively stole a car recently, and the odd events that followed.
Penance is a letter from an anonymous source (perhaps Weidar himself?) discussing the disappearance, and assumed murder, of a man, Sebastian Weidar, working for a large bit shadowy pharma conglomerate, his job to dispense cash bribes to doctors and others.
The more digital the world becomes, the more important is the cash-based choreography that constituted the frame of Weidar’s work. If you believe it’s all zeroes and ones these days, well, then you’ve never seen the hand an underpaid scientist will place on a fat, unaddressed envelope during a bistro lunch after a few months of lapsed academic integrity.
But he disappeared/was killed when he lost a large suitcase of cash - the loss we realise being an accidental side-effect of Greger's impulsive act.
[As an aside, Weidar's boss Janzon has, for some reason, an intriguing and unexplained Korean connection - serving bulgogi wraps at dinner parties; obsessed with photos of Korean cheesecake; and with strong views on the chemically disastrous combination of that staple of Korean birthday cakes - Kiwis on cream]
The third story, Speech At A Wedding is, indeed a speech delivered at a wedding, but one written by an uninvited and absent party, and delivered by a hired actress (and later we realise hired also for a more sinister act), condeming the groom, a business man.
The fourth The Loser's Claustrophobia draws, as is acknowledged at the start of the book, heavily on the work of social psychologist Paul Piff, and experiments he performed observing participants in clearly rigged games of Monopoly. One player gets to roll two dice the other one; starts with more money and collects more when they pass go; and cannot Go to Jail - but Piff's experiments revealed that both the advantaged player, and, but to a lesser extent, the disadvantaged one tended to attribute the former's inevitable win to skill and willpower rather than an inbuild advantage.
And disadvantaged players who received mid-game coaching, were convinced they could now win, or indeed were pulling back into the game, despite all the evidence:
P: If I’d only pulled myself together better, I could have won. Or had a chance.
E: But you didn’t get any hotels, and you only had two houses.
P: Sure.
E: While your opponent bought, let’s see . . . Right, he had Fenchurch Street, the Angel, Islington, Whitechapel, Marlborough Street, Coventry Street, Oxford Street and Mayfair after just three rounds. You had completed only one round, and had bought–ah . . . right, Piccadilly.
P: Right.
E: And after five rounds he had hotels on Park Lane and Mayfair.
P: Wasn’t that when I bought Old Kent Road, though?
The story itself consists of notes on designing the experiments and observations of the results, as well as a side-story (whose significance escaped me) about one of the experimenters and his relationship with a woman he met in a bar. The experimenters also talk about a famous person Simmons, who is in a coma after a murder attempt, which may link to the previous story.
This was perhaps the most interesting story in terms of it's observations on money - except one can glean the information from the source via Paul Piff's TED talk.
The fifth, and title, story has a divorced couple enacting their annual 'play', at the wife's family's island summer home, designed to convince her mother than they are still married, so she doesn't disinherit them. The economically unsuccessful divorced husband works on scripts to dub English cartoons into Swedish (so that the Swedish words fit the character's mouth movements); plans plots for crime novels he doesn't actually write (the plot sketches included in the story); and works nights as a taxi driver to make ends meet (in which guise he appears in other stories, for example giving Weidar a lift).
Perhaps the weakest of the longlist for me, although a worthwhile read. 2.5 stars.
International Booker judges' citation
‘A separated couple are forced to revert to married life for an annual holiday in order to secure an inheritance. A researcher using Monopoly to study societal inequality discovers for herself how love corrupts. Money makes the world go round and Ia Genberg has a deep, clear-eyed vision of how. The dramatic distinctness of the five stories that make up Small Comfort speaks to the might of Genberg’s imaginative powers, while the intricate threads tying them together are testament to her subtleness as a thinker. It couldn’t work without Kira Josefsson’s staggeringly flexible translation, which also stands out for the naturalness of its dialogue and wonderfully rhythmic prose. This duo’s writing zings and smarts in all the right places as we see ourselves reflected in the characters, warts and all. Breathtakingly original, profound but with a delicious dose of irreverence.’
Marriage: there’s always a winner and a loser, one who makes more withdrawals than deposits, one whose investments turn out to be wiser in the long term, who seems to constantly repay their debts right before the interest rate goes up.
Small Comfort is Kira Josefsson's translation of Klen tröst & fyra andra berättelser om pengar by Ia Genberg. The Details from the same translator/author was previously shortlisted for the 2024 edition of the International Booker.
The original full title of Small Comfort could be translated as Small Comfort and Four Other Stories About Money, and the book rather does what it says on the tin, or perhaps better what the signature of the chief cashier says on the bank note.
I’m sure you saw the briefcase on TV, stuffed with globally accepted currency, and maybe you were surprised by the shape of the bills: the cash, their physicality, their potential rustling. Cash and digital money might be the same, but in actuality they aren’t. One is traceable, the other is not–though the real difference is about something else. For instance, the fact that the words for ‘cash’ are more numerous in most languages than the words for ‘darling’, and that these two words activate the same area in the amygdala. Or that the effort a person expends on making money can be enhanced by the physical experience of money, e.g. holding it in one’s hand, or having one’s face being placed in the draught produced by riffling through a wad of notes. Looking at an account statement or a stock exchange chart doesn’t have the same effect: no glands are activated, no salivation occurs, no muscles contract. Cash, on the other hand, like a strong scent from one’s childhood, takes the fast lane to the human heart.
Although these are more 5 novellas than 5 short stories - and all 5 outstayed their welcome for me, although the different formats adopted does maintain the reader's interest for the overall project. And there are links between them - some clear, other more subtle, and I suspect some too subtle for my attention span.
Success Greger has a reporter (called Ia Genberg) interviewing a former child actor Greger Johnson who, years ago, appeared in a movie based on Astrid Lindgren's Emil i Lönneberga books - the story a recording of their interview. The reporter is interviewing various of the stars of the film for a tribute to the director, who has died, but Greger is more interested in both theorising on life and telling her how he impulsively stole a car recently, and the odd events that followed.
Penance is a letter from an anonymous source (perhaps Weidar himself?) discussing the disappearance, and assumed murder, of a man, Sebastian Weidar, working for a large bit shadowy pharma conglomerate, his job to dispense cash bribes to doctors and others.
The more digital the world becomes, the more important is the cash-based choreography that constituted the frame of Weidar’s work. If you believe it’s all zeroes and ones these days, well, then you’ve never seen the hand an underpaid scientist will place on a fat, unaddressed envelope during a bistro lunch after a few months of lapsed academic integrity.
But he disappeared/was killed when he lost a large suitcase of cash - the loss we realise being an accidental side-effect of Greger's impulsive act.
[As an aside, Weidar's boss Janzon has, for some reason, an intriguing and unexplained Korean connection - serving bulgogi wraps at dinner parties; obsessed with photos of Korean cheesecake; and with strong views on the chemically disastrous combination of that staple of Korean birthday cakes - Kiwis on cream]
The third story, Speech At A Wedding is, indeed a speech delivered at a wedding, but one written by an uninvited and absent party, and delivered by a hired actress (and later we realise hired also for a more sinister act), condeming the groom, a business man.
The fourth The Loser's Claustrophobia draws, as is acknowledged at the start of the book, heavily on the work of social psychologist Paul Piff, and experiments he performed observing participants in clearly rigged games of Monopoly. One player gets to roll two dice the other one; starts with more money and collects more when they pass go; and cannot Go to Jail - but Piff's experiments revealed that both the advantaged player, and, but to a lesser extent, the disadvantaged one tended to attribute the former's inevitable win to skill and willpower rather than an inbuild advantage.
And disadvantaged players who received mid-game coaching, were convinced they could now win, or indeed were pulling back into the game, despite all the evidence:
P: If I’d only pulled myself together better, I could have won. Or had a chance.
E: But you didn’t get any hotels, and you only had two houses.
P: Sure.
E: While your opponent bought, let’s see . . . Right, he had Fenchurch Street, the Angel, Islington, Whitechapel, Marlborough Street, Coventry Street, Oxford Street and Mayfair after just three rounds. You had completed only one round, and had bought–ah . . . right, Piccadilly.
P: Right.
E: And after five rounds he had hotels on Park Lane and Mayfair.
P: Wasn’t that when I bought Old Kent Road, though?
The story itself consists of notes on designing the experiments and observations of the results, as well as a side-story (whose significance escaped me) about one of the experimenters and his relationship with a woman he met in a bar. The experimenters also talk about a famous person Simmons, who is in a coma after a murder attempt, which may link to the previous story.
This was perhaps the most interesting story in terms of it's observations on money - except one can glean the information from the source via Paul Piff's TED talk.
The fifth, and title, story has a divorced couple enacting their annual 'play', at the wife's family's island summer home, designed to convince her mother than they are still married, so she doesn't disinherit them. The economically unsuccessful divorced husband works on scripts to dub English cartoons into Swedish (so that the Swedish words fit the character's mouth movements); plans plots for crime novels he doesn't actually write (the plot sketches included in the story); and works nights as a taxi driver to make ends meet (in which guise he appears in other stories, for example giving Weidar a lift).
Perhaps the weakest of the longlist for me, although a worthwhile read. 2.5 stars.
International Booker judges' citation
‘A separated couple are forced to revert to married life for an annual holiday in order to secure an inheritance. A researcher using Monopoly to study societal inequality discovers for herself how love corrupts. Money makes the world go round and Ia Genberg has a deep, clear-eyed vision of how. The dramatic distinctness of the five stories that make up Small Comfort speaks to the might of Genberg’s imaginative powers, while the intricate threads tying them together are testament to her subtleness as a thinker. It couldn’t work without Kira Josefsson’s staggeringly flexible translation, which also stands out for the naturalness of its dialogue and wonderfully rhythmic prose. This duo’s writing zings and smarts in all the right places as we see ourselves reflected in the characters, warts and all. Breathtakingly original, profound but with a delicious dose of irreverence.’
March 22, 2026
a collection of 5 interconnected short stories about money and the role it plays in our lives and relationships. there’s just something about ia genberg’s writing (and josefsson’s translation) that really scratches my brain. i don’t think this will be for everyone but it was for me!
March 2, 2026
3.5. In five connected short stories, Genberg looks at the ways in which money consciously or unconsciously affects our behavior, our view of the world around us, and the relationships we have with other people.
Playing with form throughout, these stories take the shape of an interview between Genberg herself and a failed child star fixated on wealth and his lack of it, of a wedding speech delivered by proxy through an actress that builds to a dramatic conclusion, of a research log for a PhD student studying the effects of temporary wealth by modifying the rules of Monopoly.
Some of these stories worked better than others, though I often felt the way the theme "money makes people act in strange ways" was explored was a bit on the nose, simplistic, and just rather obvious? Nothing that anybody does, says, or thinks in these stories will surprise anyone and I think that's one of the reasons this wasn't a standout read for me. It's easy to look at the world around us and see even more extreme examples of the ways in which people do insane or unethical things for money and power and so this exploration felt a bit tame and self-evident. Perhaps I wanted it to probe deeper into the psychological and philosophical theories around the topic.
All descriptions say this book is about money, but I found it was equally about truth and the ways in which it is often irrelevant in the face of stronger forces. This goes hand in hand with the theme of money and its influence, but this angle interested me more with its relevance to the world around us and the ways in which the truth is denied or easily evaded by those with power and wealth.
Genberg's writing (as seen through Josefsson's translation) is stylistically straightforward and didn't capture me in the same was that it did in The Details.
A bit uninspiring for my tastes, but not one I regret reading.
Playing with form throughout, these stories take the shape of an interview between Genberg herself and a failed child star fixated on wealth and his lack of it, of a wedding speech delivered by proxy through an actress that builds to a dramatic conclusion, of a research log for a PhD student studying the effects of temporary wealth by modifying the rules of Monopoly.
Some of these stories worked better than others, though I often felt the way the theme "money makes people act in strange ways" was explored was a bit on the nose, simplistic, and just rather obvious? Nothing that anybody does, says, or thinks in these stories will surprise anyone and I think that's one of the reasons this wasn't a standout read for me. It's easy to look at the world around us and see even more extreme examples of the ways in which people do insane or unethical things for money and power and so this exploration felt a bit tame and self-evident. Perhaps I wanted it to probe deeper into the psychological and philosophical theories around the topic.
All descriptions say this book is about money, but I found it was equally about truth and the ways in which it is often irrelevant in the face of stronger forces. This goes hand in hand with the theme of money and its influence, but this angle interested me more with its relevance to the world around us and the ways in which the truth is denied or easily evaded by those with power and wealth.
Genberg's writing (as seen through Josefsson's translation) is stylistically straightforward and didn't capture me in the same was that it did in The Details.
A bit uninspiring for my tastes, but not one I regret reading.
March 19, 2026
Interesting (and supposedly interlinked?) stories about money and wealth that make you reflect on our modern world. Some stories I really liked, others I admired more than I enjoyed reading them. Like in Genberg's The Details the character descriptions are beautifully detailed and realistic again. A fascinating read.
Thank you Headline and Netgalley UK for the ARC.
Thank you Headline and Netgalley UK for the ARC.
March 28, 2026
Was torn between 3 and 4 stars but going with the latter as this is a super unique short story collection. All of the stories revolve around money and the way normal people can be corrupted by it. I loved the first story and the last two the best out of the whole lot. I really like short story collections which experiment with form and keep you interested which this one does very well. I’d recommend this as it really captivated me.
Currently reading
March 30, 2026Longlisted for the 2026 International Booker Prize
[currently reading]
/////////////
what the judges said:
‘A separated couple are forced to revert to married life for an annual holiday in order to secure an inheritance. A researcher using Monopoly to study societal inequality discovers for herself how love corrupts. Money makes the world go round and Ia Genberg has a deep, clear-eyed vision of how. The dramatic distinctness of the five stories that make up Small Comfort speaks to the might of Genberg’s imaginative powers, while the intricate threads tying them together are testament to her subtleness as a thinker. It couldn’t work without Kira Josefsson’s staggeringly flexible translation, which also stands out for the naturalness of its dialogue and wonderfully rhythmic prose. This duo’s writing zings and smarts in all the right places as we see ourselves reflected in the characters, warts and all. Breathtakingly original, profound but with a delicious dose of irreverence.’
about the author:
Swedish author Ia Genberg, born in 1967, began her writing career as a journalist
She published her debut novel Sweet Friday in 2012. She went on to write Belated Farewell (2013), Small Comfort (2018) and The Details (2022) – all widely praised by critics and frequently featured on Swedish bestseller lists.
The Details, shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2024 and winner of the August Prize 2022, has sold in 39 territories around the world. The English language edition of Small Comfort, translated by Kira Josefsson, was longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2026.
about the translator:
Kira Josefsson is a writer and literary translator working between Swedish and English
In her translation, Ia Genberg’s The Details was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2024, Judith Kiros’s O was a finalist for the Barrios Book in Translation Prize, and Johanna Hedman’s The Trio was on the shortlist for the Bernard Shaw Prize.
She lives in New York City, where she writes on US issues in the Swedish press and organises with the National Writers Union.
=============
2026 International Booker Longlist: In-Progress Rankings
—The Remembered Soldier, Anjet Daanje (tr. David McKay)
—She Who Remains, Rene Karabash (tr. Izidora Angel)
—The Director, Daniel Kehlmann (tr. Ross Benjamin)
—The Deserters, Mathias Enard (tr. Charlotte Mandell)
/////////////
—On Earth As It Is Beneath, Ana Paula Maia (tr. Padma Viswanathan)
—Women Without Men, Shahrnush Parsipur (tr. Faridoun Farrokh)
—The Wax Child, Olga Ravn (tr. Martin Aitken)
—The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran, Shida Bazyar (tr. Ruth Martin)
—Taiwan Travelogue, Yáng Shuāng-zĩ (tr. Lin King)
—We Are Green & Trembling, Gabriela Cabezón Cámara (tr. Robin Myers)
[10/13 & currently reading: The Duke, Matteo Melchiore (tr. Antonella Lettieri) & Small Comfort, la Genberg (tr. Kira Josefsson)]
[currently reading]
/////////////
what the judges said:
‘A separated couple are forced to revert to married life for an annual holiday in order to secure an inheritance. A researcher using Monopoly to study societal inequality discovers for herself how love corrupts. Money makes the world go round and Ia Genberg has a deep, clear-eyed vision of how. The dramatic distinctness of the five stories that make up Small Comfort speaks to the might of Genberg’s imaginative powers, while the intricate threads tying them together are testament to her subtleness as a thinker. It couldn’t work without Kira Josefsson’s staggeringly flexible translation, which also stands out for the naturalness of its dialogue and wonderfully rhythmic prose. This duo’s writing zings and smarts in all the right places as we see ourselves reflected in the characters, warts and all. Breathtakingly original, profound but with a delicious dose of irreverence.’
about the author:
Swedish author Ia Genberg, born in 1967, began her writing career as a journalist
She published her debut novel Sweet Friday in 2012. She went on to write Belated Farewell (2013), Small Comfort (2018) and The Details (2022) – all widely praised by critics and frequently featured on Swedish bestseller lists.
The Details, shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2024 and winner of the August Prize 2022, has sold in 39 territories around the world. The English language edition of Small Comfort, translated by Kira Josefsson, was longlisted for the International Booker Prize 2026.
about the translator:
Kira Josefsson is a writer and literary translator working between Swedish and English
In her translation, Ia Genberg’s The Details was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2024, Judith Kiros’s O was a finalist for the Barrios Book in Translation Prize, and Johanna Hedman’s The Trio was on the shortlist for the Bernard Shaw Prize.
She lives in New York City, where she writes on US issues in the Swedish press and organises with the National Writers Union.
=============
2026 International Booker Longlist: In-Progress Rankings
—The Remembered Soldier, Anjet Daanje (tr. David McKay)
—She Who Remains, Rene Karabash (tr. Izidora Angel)
—The Director, Daniel Kehlmann (tr. Ross Benjamin)
—The Deserters, Mathias Enard (tr. Charlotte Mandell)
/////////////
—On Earth As It Is Beneath, Ana Paula Maia (tr. Padma Viswanathan)
—Women Without Men, Shahrnush Parsipur (tr. Faridoun Farrokh)
—The Wax Child, Olga Ravn (tr. Martin Aitken)
—The Nights Are Quiet in Tehran, Shida Bazyar (tr. Ruth Martin)
—Taiwan Travelogue, Yáng Shuāng-zĩ (tr. Lin King)
—We Are Green & Trembling, Gabriela Cabezón Cámara (tr. Robin Myers)
[10/13 & currently reading: The Duke, Matteo Melchiore (tr. Antonella Lettieri) & Small Comfort, la Genberg (tr. Kira Josefsson)]
March 10, 2026
Begynte bra, men datt fort av. Kvifor denne er på den internasjonale Booker langliste er eit mysterium.
March 12, 2026
Thank you NetGalley and Headline for providing me a copy of this book. Small Comfort is longlisted for the International Booker Prize for 2026, and this is my first completed book from the prize. I found this just okay. Small Comfort is a collection of five short stories, two of them are on the longer side and three are on the shorter side. We follow different stories and characters, all in different financial situations.
Out of the five short stories, I only really enjoyed one story, and that was the first long one, where we follow the author doing an interview in prison with an actor who has turned into a thief. They had very nice dynamic and good banter. As for the other stories, I didn't much get them and didn't take out anything out of them. Although they all were beautifully written. The writing style is the strong side of this book. I am hoping that I will enjoy the other books on the longlist more than this one.
Out of the five short stories, I only really enjoyed one story, and that was the first long one, where we follow the author doing an interview in prison with an actor who has turned into a thief. They had very nice dynamic and good banter. As for the other stories, I didn't much get them and didn't take out anything out of them. Although they all were beautifully written. The writing style is the strong side of this book. I am hoping that I will enjoy the other books on the longlist more than this one.
February 20, 2025
Älskar Ia Genbergs skärpa och intellekt! Efter del 3 "Tal vid bröllop" var jag säker på att det skulle bli en 4/5 stjärnor i rating, men del 4 var så pass seg att ta sig igenom att mitt slutbetyg fick bli lägre. Jag gillade del 5 "Klen tröst", men avslutet var inte helt tillfredställande.
March 22, 2026
International Booker Prize 2026 - 10/13
3.5/5
3.5/5
March 12, 2026
Considered and funny when she’s in a playful mood. New aspiration is to be a rich woman’s concubine
March 19, 2026
Favourite so far on the Booker longlist.
March 26, 2026
IBPL 7.5
Clever series of lightly interlinked stories on the theme of money and the corroding influence it can have over people’s behaviours. Written in very different styles, I found the last of the book which was the most straightforward in style worked best for me. Overall thought provoking stuff if a little heavy handed in its messaging and at times rather over bearing stylistically
Clever series of lightly interlinked stories on the theme of money and the corroding influence it can have over people’s behaviours. Written in very different styles, I found the last of the book which was the most straightforward in style worked best for me. Overall thought provoking stuff if a little heavy handed in its messaging and at times rather over bearing stylistically
August 18, 2019
Briljant, rolig & skickligt skriven!
January 25, 2022
De första två novellerna var riktigt bra! De andra tre var också bra. En bok som säger sig handla om pengar, men det handlar såklart egentligen om människan, precis som det ska vara.
March 27, 2026
This is a collection of 5 short stories about money, so I’m going to review them separately.
Success Greger
A journalist is sent to interview a child actor for an article they are doing to honor the death of a great director. The child actor has since done stints in jail and doesn’t seem to have reformed much. He would much rather talk about money and the difference between those who have it and those who don’t and the car he stole recently. The story is a recording of the interview written as dialogue between the two.
The actor gives you the same impression as a drunk spewing conspiracy theories out loud on the bus on your way to work. You’re annoyed and dismissive, but you know he’s right about some percentage of it. Is it interesting? Not really. This specific story was published in Swedish on storytel so I listened to it there, and on audio I really liked it. ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Penance
A letter from an anonymous person informs about the disappearance and assumed death of Sebastian Weidar. A man working for big pharma doing bribes.
There’s good and bad here, but my first instinct is that it’s confusing if it’s meant to be epistolary format. Is the whole story the letter? Who writes 50 page letters? This has always annoyed me about this format. It’s not believable to me. I would say that the story had some entertaining musings about talking shit or “shit talk” as the novel calls it.
“That’s the detail that stops lie detectors from picking up on shit-talk: it would be like attempting to check the outdoor temperature with a tape measure. Shit-talkers always bring a tape measure when it’s time to get a sense of the weather.”
It's entertaining, but I wasn’t really fully able to grasp what it was really about. Again, much like the first, feels like a ranting man in public talking to himself. There was also talk about a stolen car and a briefcase here, are these stories somewhat connected? ⭐⭐⭐
Speech at a wedding
The speech at the wedding is literally that, a speech held by an actress written by a party not invited. The speech is cryptic and uses curiosity to be able to keep performing without interruption. But if I’m being honest, I don’t see this happening. There’s no way I - as either the couple, the family, or a close personal friend would allow a strange actress to stand and deliver a speech in front of 80 of your closest friends of family when you start throwing out serious accusations. And even though I find this a bit unbelievable, I did like it. I thought the start was more impactful and I was more curious, but the longer it went on, the more I lost track of what the actress, or speech or even the writer was trying to say with this. But it was a fast read and the writing style is very good. ⭐⭐⭐
The Loser's Claustrophobia
I just watched Paul Piff’s TED talk “Does money make you mean” and it feels like a behind the scenes of qualitative research. Complete with research notes and questionnaires.
This one is hard for me to review, because I found the research and TED talk interesting, but having just watched that, the short story was a bit boring to read because I already knew the outcome and for me it got too repetitive. ⭐⭐⭐
Small comfort
A couple pretends to be happily married every summer in front of her family so that her rich mother doesn’t inherit them. He’s offered 25% of the inheritance to play along. Meanwhile he’s planning on writing crime novels and pitches us synopsis for some fun thrillers. The rest of this story isn’t so fun. But it’s ok. I wasn’t very interested, but it is interesting the lengths people are willing to go to for money. ⭐⭐⭐
All in all I found these stories mid, but with some interesting points. I wouldn’t call it uplifting, but it was the “lightest” of the international booker nominees, so it became a welcomed break from the rest of the bleak ones.
Success Greger
A journalist is sent to interview a child actor for an article they are doing to honor the death of a great director. The child actor has since done stints in jail and doesn’t seem to have reformed much. He would much rather talk about money and the difference between those who have it and those who don’t and the car he stole recently. The story is a recording of the interview written as dialogue between the two.
The actor gives you the same impression as a drunk spewing conspiracy theories out loud on the bus on your way to work. You’re annoyed and dismissive, but you know he’s right about some percentage of it. Is it interesting? Not really. This specific story was published in Swedish on storytel so I listened to it there, and on audio I really liked it. ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Penance
A letter from an anonymous person informs about the disappearance and assumed death of Sebastian Weidar. A man working for big pharma doing bribes.
There’s good and bad here, but my first instinct is that it’s confusing if it’s meant to be epistolary format. Is the whole story the letter? Who writes 50 page letters? This has always annoyed me about this format. It’s not believable to me. I would say that the story had some entertaining musings about talking shit or “shit talk” as the novel calls it.
“That’s the detail that stops lie detectors from picking up on shit-talk: it would be like attempting to check the outdoor temperature with a tape measure. Shit-talkers always bring a tape measure when it’s time to get a sense of the weather.”
It's entertaining, but I wasn’t really fully able to grasp what it was really about. Again, much like the first, feels like a ranting man in public talking to himself. There was also talk about a stolen car and a briefcase here, are these stories somewhat connected? ⭐⭐⭐
Speech at a wedding
The speech at the wedding is literally that, a speech held by an actress written by a party not invited. The speech is cryptic and uses curiosity to be able to keep performing without interruption. But if I’m being honest, I don’t see this happening. There’s no way I - as either the couple, the family, or a close personal friend would allow a strange actress to stand and deliver a speech in front of 80 of your closest friends of family when you start throwing out serious accusations. And even though I find this a bit unbelievable, I did like it. I thought the start was more impactful and I was more curious, but the longer it went on, the more I lost track of what the actress, or speech or even the writer was trying to say with this. But it was a fast read and the writing style is very good. ⭐⭐⭐
The Loser's Claustrophobia
I just watched Paul Piff’s TED talk “Does money make you mean” and it feels like a behind the scenes of qualitative research. Complete with research notes and questionnaires.
This one is hard for me to review, because I found the research and TED talk interesting, but having just watched that, the short story was a bit boring to read because I already knew the outcome and for me it got too repetitive. ⭐⭐⭐
Small comfort
A couple pretends to be happily married every summer in front of her family so that her rich mother doesn’t inherit them. He’s offered 25% of the inheritance to play along. Meanwhile he’s planning on writing crime novels and pitches us synopsis for some fun thrillers. The rest of this story isn’t so fun. But it’s ok. I wasn’t very interested, but it is interesting the lengths people are willing to go to for money. ⭐⭐⭐
All in all I found these stories mid, but with some interesting points. I wouldn’t call it uplifting, but it was the “lightest” of the international booker nominees, so it became a welcomed break from the rest of the bleak ones.
March 21, 2026
This was a fascinating book to read by the Swedish author Ia Genberg, whose previous novel, The Details, had great reviews (added to TBR pile). It is a set of five loosely connected short stories: some of the characters and incidents appear in the different stories but most importantly the theme across the whole is the impact of money on people and their behaviours and interactions with others. The five short pieces have very individual styles: Success Greger is an interview between a child actor, now an adult with a criminal past, with a journalist (I G); Penance a letter about a disappeared employee of a big Pharma company in Mexico; Speech at a Wedding being a surprise speech voiced by an actor to discomfort a businessman; The Loser’s Claustrophobia fictionalising a real research study using a rigged Monopoly game to expose characteristics of winners and losers; Small Comfort showing how the family of a rich widow act together to hide the divorce of her daughter so that a large inheritance is not lost. Money is portrayed as a dehumanising influence.
Overall a thought provoking and challenging book which I felt at times stretched the overarching premise about the corrosive effect of money/financial success.
Overall a thought provoking and challenging book which I felt at times stretched the overarching premise about the corrosive effect of money/financial success.
Want to read
March 6, 2026Small Comfort is an intricately built and wickedly humorous collection of five interconnected stories about money.
From an interview with a child-star-turned-thief to the mysterious death of an employee at a drug manufacturer – or the couple feigning marital bliss to keep their inheritance, Ia Genberg carefully unravels the value we place on both money and people.
What does it really mean to be in debt to someone? How does our financial worth permeate the ways we think and feel? And what do we lose when we supposedly win?
An original and thought-provoking short-story collection, Small Comfort skewers its characters, slyly implicating the reader along the way. It’s published in the UK by Wildfire. This extract is taken from the opening of the book.
From an interview with a child-star-turned-thief to the mysterious death of an employee at a drug manufacturer – or the couple feigning marital bliss to keep their inheritance, Ia Genberg carefully unravels the value we place on both money and people.
What does it really mean to be in debt to someone? How does our financial worth permeate the ways we think and feel? And what do we lose when we supposedly win?
An original and thought-provoking short-story collection, Small Comfort skewers its characters, slyly implicating the reader along the way. It’s published in the UK by Wildfire. This extract is taken from the opening of the book.
March 28, 2026
3.75 rounded up.
Small Comfort by Ia Genberg — brief thoughts
This is an experimental collection of five linked pieces, each told in a different form: an interview (where Genberg appears as a character), a corporate letter, a staged wedding speech, research-style notes, and a more traditional domestic narrative. The final piece is substantial enough to read like a novella.
On the surface, the stories deal with money and its effects. More interestingly though, they treat human relationships as systems of exchange, where things like fear, guilt, revenge, status, and love function as their own kinds of currency. Each form reinforces this idea by showing a different way value is created, performed, or manipulated. At the same time, the book suggests that some experiences, especially loss or violence, can’t be reduced to any system of value.
It’s a thoughtful and well-constructed work, but it didn’t fully land for me. The ideas are strong, though at times they feel more conceptual than emotionally engaging.
Small Comfort by Ia Genberg — brief thoughts
This is an experimental collection of five linked pieces, each told in a different form: an interview (where Genberg appears as a character), a corporate letter, a staged wedding speech, research-style notes, and a more traditional domestic narrative. The final piece is substantial enough to read like a novella.
On the surface, the stories deal with money and its effects. More interestingly though, they treat human relationships as systems of exchange, where things like fear, guilt, revenge, status, and love function as their own kinds of currency. Each form reinforces this idea by showing a different way value is created, performed, or manipulated. At the same time, the book suggests that some experiences, especially loss or violence, can’t be reduced to any system of value.
It’s a thoughtful and well-constructed work, but it didn’t fully land for me. The ideas are strong, though at times they feel more conceptual than emotionally engaging.
March 22, 2026
International Booker Prize 2026 - 7/13
what a delightful little collection of stories. Genberg does a wonderful job of writing these stories - about money, family, people, the value we place on things - and, at the same time, writing a compelling plot alongside these themes. i particularly liked the final story “small comfort”, and the penultimate “the loser’s claustrophobia”
what a delightful little collection of stories. Genberg does a wonderful job of writing these stories - about money, family, people, the value we place on things - and, at the same time, writing a compelling plot alongside these themes. i particularly liked the final story “small comfort”, and the penultimate “the loser’s claustrophobia”
Read
March 23, 2026Så underhållande med många tvära kast, men Genberg är som bäst när hon stannar upp. Jag tycker om hennes sätt att fästa blicken vid något till synes alldagligt och sväva in och ut ur tanke; det är hennes öga för detaljer som ringar in författarskapet.
December 4, 2023
Riktigt bra!
Fem olika noveller som handlar om pengar. Eller om människans relation till pengar och var den kan göra med oss. Mina favoriter var 1 och 5 men tyckte att alla var väldigt bra!
Fem olika noveller som handlar om pengar. Eller om människans relation till pengar och var den kan göra med oss. Mina favoriter var 1 och 5 men tyckte att alla var väldigt bra!
July 4, 2025
Den började starkt, men tappade bort mig redan i den tredje novellen.
March 15, 2026
Success Greger: 4/5
Penance: 2/5
Speech at a Wedding: 2/5
The Loser's Claustrophobia: 4/5
Small Comfort: 3/5
Penance: 2/5
Speech at a Wedding: 2/5
The Loser's Claustrophobia: 4/5
Small Comfort: 3/5
March 31, 2026
I credibly surprised this was nominated
Did not finish
February 18, 2026DNF. Läste 3/5 berättelser och började på de båda andra men känner absolut ingenting för dem.
Review of advance copy received from Netgalley
Lukas remains on his feet, ready for a rhetorical excursion, a Kantian struggle where the one with the best starting position inevitably emerges victorious, since there is technically nothing that can get at this introductory assertion. The truth is true, period. It's a sly strategy, partly since truth's defender is always the one who sets the rules of the game, and partly because only he is free to move his positions. All the loser can do is change the character of his dis-advantage. It's impossible to explain to someone in their late teens that the truth can be both slippery and relative. That it can be discoloured, unpleasant. That it tends to be banged up already when you take it out of its package. That it often ends up being small comfort. Few parents succeed; most give up halfway, perhaps right where I am now, side by side with Kant and next to the demanding ethics that marinate the brains of an eighteen-year-old in unbearable hubris.
Longlisted for the 2026 International Booker Prize.
Originally published in 2018 and translated from Swedish by Kira Josefsson – the author and translator combination having been shortlisted for the same prize in 2024 for Genberg’s most acclaimed work “The Details” (originally published in 2022).
And the full title of the 2018 publication would translate as “Small Comfort and Four Other Stories About Money”, which accurately represents this collection of (in many cases almost novella length albeit quick to read) stories which are linked only tangentially character wise but much more strongly thematically – around the impact of money and economics on a variety or relationships.
The opening story is the slightly oddly named “Success Greger” and the set up is strong: a journalist (who share’s the author’s name) is writing the text for a retrospective about a famous director for a magazine, and is interviewing Greger Johnson – who was a one-hit wonder child actor playing Astrid Lindgren’s Emil of Lönneberga. But to her despair (the recording includes her own brief phone calls during breaks) Greger is far more interested philosophising on: work, money and wealth (including challenging the interviewees middle class views as being very different from the rich or poor); his main occupation buying up deceased’s possessions/estates on the cheap and hoping for a serendipitous find (a valuable book, some hidden money); and a recent incident where he stole a car (which he founds with its engine running) only to crash it into a ditch. With an intriguing promise the story seems to lose its way (despite being over 100 pages so with the space for a more thoughtful narrative arc) as the latter story (and in a second interview Greger’s apparent realisation that he has stumbled into serious trouble via his actions) dominates.
The second story “Penance” is set up as a letter addressed to a woman giving details of the death of a mutual acquaintances – his body dumped in a deserts apparently after a hit ordered by a Pharma firm now subject of media speculation – the hit seemingly due to him leaving a briefcase stuffed with cash (designed for bribing doctors and scientists) in a running car (the one of course Greger stole). There are lots of intriguing side stories – the alleged victim going cold turkey from pills manufactured by his employer and which he had been taking for almost his whole life with the side effects, a character with a critical obsession with Korean birthday cakes, a riff on the enduring power of cash in a digital world (which dates the book as pre Covid) and so on – which I think might have been interestingly developed in a novel but which felt rather extraneous in a short story.
The third “Speech at a Wedding” (and by far the shortest) was I felt both contrived in plot and out of place in the collection – in essence an actress is hired to give an unasked for speech at a wedding - as part of a plot to get reputational (and later physical) revenge on a corrupt business man (possibly the boss of the Pharma firm).
The fourth “The Loser’s Claustrophobia” was the most intriguing – if heavily (as acknowledged) based on real life research by Paul Piff of Berkley, University of California based on explicitly one-sided/rigged games of monopoly where nevertheless the almost inevitable winners and losers attribute credit/blame to themselves and the richer player (entirely through circumstance) even modifies their other behaviour. The story is told as though from the researcher’s working notes on the design and results – and I have to say (having seen Piff’s TED talk) is actually more effective than the original research in drawing some of the lessons, including a fascinating part on coaching (which I am unsure if it was in the original research). Again there are some intriguing but extraneous details – although at one point two characters to seem to be discussing the incident in the third story.
The fifth titular story was I think by far the strongest – a really nicely observed story about a divorced couple (and their grown up children) who once a year perform as though still married so as not to blow a potential future inheritance – the husband is a taxi driver/wanabee crime writer/cartoon dubber and appears in at least one of the previous stories. But what makes the story is firstly some theorising on marriage which presents everything in economic terms (with the two parties gaining emotional, practical as well as purely monetary trading positions and balances) and some really intelligent repartee between the family members which even the narrator at one stage causes “priceless entertainment”.
Overall I had mixed feelings – I think its worthy of a longlist place, as it brings some welcome variety and was an always entertaining read, while often also thought provoking. However while the book reminded me of some of the writing of Edward St Aubyn or Tom McCarthy – I do feel that both those writers manage to weave in more ideas, more deeply explore those ideas and add a more developed fictional scaffolding – and I cannot help but feel that the collected story nature here, while perhaps easier for the author was far less satisfying for the reader.
My thanks to Headline for an ARC via NetGalley
I’m on the outside of that system. I go straight to the source, the money. I search for valuables, buy cheap and sell expensively. I am society’s revolving door, the nave where goods turn into money. The centre. Everything you see will ultimately end up in my hands, where it is assessed and sold or trashed. You see a dresser, your grandma’s dresser where she kept her jewellery and stationery. I see money. All I see is that dresser’s value. Or, rather, I find a hidden compartment that only Granny knew about, where she kept her real diamonds. And when I find them? I see money. There’s a price for everything. People don’t realise that, but you can put a price on everything. Everything can be transformed into money.
July 4, 2018
Personligen gillar jag novellformatet, men sällan lyckas författare så exceptionellt bra som Genberg. Samtliga fem noveller är kärnfulla och har en bra "fart". Genberg har även en otrolig blick på sin samtid, och på pengar. Och är man ute efter träffande samtidskritik så är det här verkligen värt läsningen.
Genberg skapar även en sammanhängde värld med sina berättelser, karaktärerna och problematiken dyker upp i flera berättelser och bildar tillsammans en tråd som ger ytterligare en stomme till samlingen utöver den utpekade gemensamma nämnaren, pengar.
Genberg skapar även en sammanhängde värld med sina berättelser, karaktärerna och problematiken dyker upp i flera berättelser och bildar tillsammans en tråd som ger ytterligare en stomme till samlingen utöver den utpekade gemensamma nämnaren, pengar.
May 4, 2023
Jag älskar Ia genberg! Genialisk bok, framförallt den fjärde novellen förlorarens klaustrofobi, men också bara hur alla noveller tillsammans i sina olikheter ger en sån bra bild av vad pengar gör med människor.
February 1, 2024
1 och 4 = super bra, men kunde tyvärr inte följa annars????
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