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To Mervas
Shortlisted for Sweden's August Prize, Elisabeth Rynell's To Mervas is a vivid exploration of both external and internal wilderness. Marta, a middle-aged woman who has withdrawn almost completely into herself, is jolted back into contact with the world by a letter from her once-great love. Physical and emotional abuse, longing and loss, and the nature of love and redemption are explored with remarkable empathy and a visceral lyricism in Rynell's wrenching novel. Elisabeth Rynell is a novelist and a poet. Her first novel, Hohaj, was adapted into the film Snowland, To Mervas is her first novel to appear in English. Victoria Hggblom is a writer and translator. She has received several translation grants and awards from the PEN American Center, the Swedish Institute, and others.
225 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2002
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143 people want to read
About the author
Elisabeth Rynell
19 books11 followersElisabeth Rynell (born 17 May 1954) is a Swedish poet and novelist. Her novel Till Mervas (2002), the first to be translated into English, appeared in 2011 as Mervas.
Born in Stockholm, Rynell was the daughter of an English teacher and a nurse. After completing her schooling, she spent a year in England as an au pair. She has also visited Iran and Afghanistan on an overland trip to Pakistan and India. After spending much of her life in the far north of Sweden, she now lives in Stockholm and Hälsingland.
After her husband died when he was only 22, Rynell embarked on her writing career, publishing seven collections of poetry and four novels, both highly esteemed in Sweden. Her first collection of poems Nattliga samtal (Noctural Conversations) appeared in 1990 but it was her novel Hohaj (1997) which brought her into the limelight and earned her two literary prizes. Her most recent work, Skrivandets sinne (Sense of Writing, 2013) is a collection of autobiographical essays evoking her writings about the city and the countryside as well as accounts of her closest friends, including the author Sara Lidman.
Elisabeth Rydall has received several awards including the Swedish Radio Novel Prize in 1998 for Hohal, the Swedish Academy's Dobloug Prize in 2007 and the Sara Lidman Prize in 2014.
(from Wikipedia)
Born in Stockholm, Rynell was the daughter of an English teacher and a nurse. After completing her schooling, she spent a year in England as an au pair. She has also visited Iran and Afghanistan on an overland trip to Pakistan and India. After spending much of her life in the far north of Sweden, she now lives in Stockholm and Hälsingland.
After her husband died when he was only 22, Rynell embarked on her writing career, publishing seven collections of poetry and four novels, both highly esteemed in Sweden. Her first collection of poems Nattliga samtal (Noctural Conversations) appeared in 1990 but it was her novel Hohaj (1997) which brought her into the limelight and earned her two literary prizes. Her most recent work, Skrivandets sinne (Sense of Writing, 2013) is a collection of autobiographical essays evoking her writings about the city and the countryside as well as accounts of her closest friends, including the author Sara Lidman.
Elisabeth Rydall has received several awards including the Swedish Radio Novel Prize in 1998 for Hohal, the Swedish Academy's Dobloug Prize in 2007 and the Sara Lidman Prize in 2014.
(from Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
February 11, 2021
I have been neglecting my Archipelago Books shelf for too long. I must say that every book I have read from this excellent publishing house of translated literature has provided great reading. To Mervas was no exception.
Marta, a solitary middle-aged Swedish spinster with a troubled past, receives a letter from her lover of over 25 years ago. He writes, "Marta, Mart! I'm in Mervas. It is not possible to get any farther away. And no closer either. Your Kosti."
Though I have never been to Sweden, I have read enough novels set there to have a feel for the country. Never had I heard of Mervas. I learned that it is a region of abandoned mining in the far north.
Marta's journal entries from the November day she receives Kosti's letter, reveal her childhood (brutal), her affair with Kosti (aborted by a huge argument), and her sad life ever since. She struggles with her fear of moving out of her lonely existence and a conviction that going to find Kosti is her last chance to make something meaningful of her life.
The writing is crystal clear, both in the telling of Marta's inner turmoil and in describing the journey she does finally make to Mervas. Elisabeth Rynell is both a poet and and a novelist. To Mervas is her third novel and the first to appear in English.
It is a story of hope. Even a woman like Marta, who has suffered from terrible trauma and losses, can pull from her suppressed memory the moments when she had strength and so venture again into life.
I loved this novel from its gorgeous cover to its final page.
Marta, a solitary middle-aged Swedish spinster with a troubled past, receives a letter from her lover of over 25 years ago. He writes, "Marta, Mart! I'm in Mervas. It is not possible to get any farther away. And no closer either. Your Kosti."
Though I have never been to Sweden, I have read enough novels set there to have a feel for the country. Never had I heard of Mervas. I learned that it is a region of abandoned mining in the far north.
Marta's journal entries from the November day she receives Kosti's letter, reveal her childhood (brutal), her affair with Kosti (aborted by a huge argument), and her sad life ever since. She struggles with her fear of moving out of her lonely existence and a conviction that going to find Kosti is her last chance to make something meaningful of her life.
The writing is crystal clear, both in the telling of Marta's inner turmoil and in describing the journey she does finally make to Mervas. Elisabeth Rynell is both a poet and and a novelist. To Mervas is her third novel and the first to appear in English.
It is a story of hope. Even a woman like Marta, who has suffered from terrible trauma and losses, can pull from her suppressed memory the moments when she had strength and so venture again into life.
I loved this novel from its gorgeous cover to its final page.
December 4, 2011
To Mervas is a heart-breakingly beautiful look into a broken woman and her lost life. Marta suffered a mental break during which something unspeakable happens (which I won't state because it is carefully laid out and selectively alluded to until it's revelation) and she spends the rest of her life in such a state of self-hatred that it is difficult for the reader to handle. But, through the course of the short novel she slowly, slowly comes to find something to believe in, something to care about. It takes a long time and she is cold and hard and alone and emotionally wrought but she finds something, however small it is. Elisabeth Rynell is a talented writer who embodies the voice of this harrowing narrator wholly and without pause. One never feels for a moment that it is simply the voice of the author peeking through. Marta was purposefully closed in and with no real human contact for many years and suddenly receives a letter from her one love whom she hadn't spoken to for 30 years. He tells her he is in Mervas, a tiny town that no longer exists, which used to be a mining village until the mining company tore it down. It now, like Marta, is only left with the marks, traces of what it used to be. Elisabeth Rynell's prose is truly honest and human, real and whole. Take for example this passage:
"Somewhere in my life is a city shrouded in darkness. It's a big city, probably a capital. All roads lead to it, into the dark, where they dissolve. I know this city exists, that like all cities it has houses and streets, that a kind of living takes places there, stories are formed, meetings and scenes. It is like a mute weave that has been pushed into the center of my life, thread upon thread of silence. And I'm afraid of it's darkness; I know that I'm from it, anything can break through: a bright, blind violence, a rage like a forest fire igniting even the air. There are monsters living there that have courted me, monsters that hatch in darkness and I don't want to see them, don't want to know about them. Sometimes I imagine that the city gulps down the darkness, that it greedily feeds itself on more and more darkness and grows, swells- and in this way it is active, a volcano in reverse. A crater that drinks and devours."
Once again Archipelago Books publishes a stunning translation of a deep, complex book written by a talented and engaging author.
"Somewhere in my life is a city shrouded in darkness. It's a big city, probably a capital. All roads lead to it, into the dark, where they dissolve. I know this city exists, that like all cities it has houses and streets, that a kind of living takes places there, stories are formed, meetings and scenes. It is like a mute weave that has been pushed into the center of my life, thread upon thread of silence. And I'm afraid of it's darkness; I know that I'm from it, anything can break through: a bright, blind violence, a rage like a forest fire igniting even the air. There are monsters living there that have courted me, monsters that hatch in darkness and I don't want to see them, don't want to know about them. Sometimes I imagine that the city gulps down the darkness, that it greedily feeds itself on more and more darkness and grows, swells- and in this way it is active, a volcano in reverse. A crater that drinks and devours."
Once again Archipelago Books publishes a stunning translation of a deep, complex book written by a talented and engaging author.
July 12, 2016
Life is so mysterious and I miss my heart, which has lost its strength.
*
I became scared of life itself, I’ll tell you, scared of how it can be and what it can do to you.
*
[...] my thoughts dug their paths and tunnels through me. I’m walking around with a longing in a constant state of alert, an impatient, chafing state of waiting. It is a longing for love and I don’t know what it wants with me, I don’t see how it could be useful. It is digging a hole through me, digging a hole to give my emptiness room to grow. I know my life cannot be shared by anyone; to burden another person with my issues would double the guilt and pain for me. If I can’t even be close to myself, how could anyone else? And still, this voice inside me is alive, this ripping longing for love so strong I’m beginning to think it’s bigger than me, bigger than my own life.
*
I became scared of life itself, I’ll tell you, scared of how it can be and what it can do to you.
*
[...] my thoughts dug their paths and tunnels through me. I’m walking around with a longing in a constant state of alert, an impatient, chafing state of waiting. It is a longing for love and I don’t know what it wants with me, I don’t see how it could be useful. It is digging a hole through me, digging a hole to give my emptiness room to grow. I know my life cannot be shared by anyone; to burden another person with my issues would double the guilt and pain for me. If I can’t even be close to myself, how could anyone else? And still, this voice inside me is alive, this ripping longing for love so strong I’m beginning to think it’s bigger than me, bigger than my own life.
March 16, 2025
det här var något av de mest vackra och våldsamma jag läst på länge. känner mig Rädd och Läkt efteråt
October 28, 2020
This is a twisted book. At times, it was compelling and poetic, but I had to take a lot of breaks. To Mervas addresses childhood trauma and it’s longitudinal effects. How the absence of need fulfillment or trauma affects later life choices. Some scenes were crafted in an engaging way like how a relationship broke apart because a emotional script followed and how that relationship script was written by childhood.
This shouldn’t be an easy read for anyone, but the novel deals with physical abuse, the loss of a child, and mental illness. It has the most graphic rape scene I remember reading. There is a lot explored about recovered memories.
The first and third parts of the novel are first person journal entries. The second is a in third person and a surreal departure I struggled through, but I think represented a journey, provided a relationship foil, and tried to capture the dysmorphia of mental illness.
The beginning of the book read like a literary mystery, but the story sort of gets lost in vague metaphor as it goes on. Is Mervas a destination, a representation of loss, a womb? I don’t know.
Ultimately, I kind of lost my engagement in the story by the end and struggled with the depictions of violence and mental illness, but I see the literary value in how these issues are explored and where others could find the novel more compelling.
This shouldn’t be an easy read for anyone, but the novel deals with physical abuse, the loss of a child, and mental illness. It has the most graphic rape scene I remember reading. There is a lot explored about recovered memories.
The first and third parts of the novel are first person journal entries. The second is a in third person and a surreal departure I struggled through, but I think represented a journey, provided a relationship foil, and tried to capture the dysmorphia of mental illness.
The beginning of the book read like a literary mystery, but the story sort of gets lost in vague metaphor as it goes on. Is Mervas a destination, a representation of loss, a womb? I don’t know.
Ultimately, I kind of lost my engagement in the story by the end and struggled with the depictions of violence and mental illness, but I see the literary value in how these issues are explored and where others could find the novel more compelling.
September 5, 2010
Translated from the Swedish by Victoria Hagglbom
“There is a quality of precision in life, an incorruptible order that cannot be made relative. Life is relentless the same way death is. Everyone has a place in their own story with a myriad of threads running forward and backward, upward and downward, like a web. If you want to cut yourself loose, you have to cut yourself off from who you are. You can’t just switch your life for another. The details of your existence may be unbearable, but they are nevertheless wrapped up neatly and connected to each other like the threads of the web.”
Marta has been living in such a web for years, since childhood. She grew up in an unimaginably difficult home, with a father that not only abused their mother (leading to her death) but also put Marta in the unenviable position of being his “helper”. His abuse was particularly horrific: he didn’t beat Marta, as long as she didn’t interfere and try and aid her mother. What child can evaluate such a position and decide what is best? Her only tactic, to cope with the fear and her sense of disloyalty was to withdraw within herself. She became the type of woman who is completely alone, even when surrounded by others.
Her upbringing made her unable to form a normal relationship with her boyfriend , Kosti, leading him to leave her, as her neediness pushed him away. The novel begins with her alone, in the years after her only child has died. The child, whom she named Sebastian but referred to usually as ‘the boy’, had severe birth defects and she had nurtured him, alone, for years. The narrative begins with her getting a letter from Kosti, telling her that he is now in a small town in northern Sweden called “Mervas”. Her isolation has put her in a place with very little human contact, and the letter impels her to finally seek the outside world. She contemplates the idea of going to see him at Mervas.
The rest of the book is her journey: both the physical journey of locating and travelling to Mervas as well as the emotional journey of making a new life. She’s constantly second guessing herself, and reliving horrific memories of her mother’s abuse. She’s not even sure she wants to see Kosti again…so much of her life has been restricted that she has atrophied, both physically and emotionally. Throughout her journey, details of her son’s tragic death emerge, and we see how it’s nearly unimaginable that she can move on into any “normal” life.
Regarding the surprise of his letter, she says “the few words he’d written were alive inside me…they’d reminded me of my life and the fact that I was still living it, that I was supposed to live it. I’d forgotten that. I’d stayed away from that truth. And a person can actually hide inside her own life, hide from life itself within the minutiae and everyday chores, hide from herself inside herself.”
As she travels to Mervas, she’s confronted with the fear of the unknown as well as an honest fear of herself. “My thoughts moved around in the room like anxious shadow animals, sniffing and listening. I almost thought I could see them flickering over the walls. Herds of fear ran down the slopes as if they were being hunted, being egged on by the thoughts and visions spinning in my head. The terror seemed to hatch in new places all the time, one vision after another appearing in long, painful sequences.”
To Mervas is the story of her journey, one that doesn’t arrive at any simple or easy conclusion. Much of the latter half of the book is ambiguous, and the reader can arrive at more than one conclusion about Marta. The value of this story, however, is clear: people are flawed, damaged, and searching. Even without consciousness, they are searching for a way out and redemption. How Marta coped with so many situations that were beyond her control is a fascinating glimpse of the resilience of the human spirit.
“There is a quality of precision in life, an incorruptible order that cannot be made relative. Life is relentless the same way death is. Everyone has a place in their own story with a myriad of threads running forward and backward, upward and downward, like a web. If you want to cut yourself loose, you have to cut yourself off from who you are. You can’t just switch your life for another. The details of your existence may be unbearable, but they are nevertheless wrapped up neatly and connected to each other like the threads of the web.”
Marta has been living in such a web for years, since childhood. She grew up in an unimaginably difficult home, with a father that not only abused their mother (leading to her death) but also put Marta in the unenviable position of being his “helper”. His abuse was particularly horrific: he didn’t beat Marta, as long as she didn’t interfere and try and aid her mother. What child can evaluate such a position and decide what is best? Her only tactic, to cope with the fear and her sense of disloyalty was to withdraw within herself. She became the type of woman who is completely alone, even when surrounded by others.
Her upbringing made her unable to form a normal relationship with her boyfriend , Kosti, leading him to leave her, as her neediness pushed him away. The novel begins with her alone, in the years after her only child has died. The child, whom she named Sebastian but referred to usually as ‘the boy’, had severe birth defects and she had nurtured him, alone, for years. The narrative begins with her getting a letter from Kosti, telling her that he is now in a small town in northern Sweden called “Mervas”. Her isolation has put her in a place with very little human contact, and the letter impels her to finally seek the outside world. She contemplates the idea of going to see him at Mervas.
The rest of the book is her journey: both the physical journey of locating and travelling to Mervas as well as the emotional journey of making a new life. She’s constantly second guessing herself, and reliving horrific memories of her mother’s abuse. She’s not even sure she wants to see Kosti again…so much of her life has been restricted that she has atrophied, both physically and emotionally. Throughout her journey, details of her son’s tragic death emerge, and we see how it’s nearly unimaginable that she can move on into any “normal” life.
Regarding the surprise of his letter, she says “the few words he’d written were alive inside me…they’d reminded me of my life and the fact that I was still living it, that I was supposed to live it. I’d forgotten that. I’d stayed away from that truth. And a person can actually hide inside her own life, hide from life itself within the minutiae and everyday chores, hide from herself inside herself.”
As she travels to Mervas, she’s confronted with the fear of the unknown as well as an honest fear of herself. “My thoughts moved around in the room like anxious shadow animals, sniffing and listening. I almost thought I could see them flickering over the walls. Herds of fear ran down the slopes as if they were being hunted, being egged on by the thoughts and visions spinning in my head. The terror seemed to hatch in new places all the time, one vision after another appearing in long, painful sequences.”
To Mervas is the story of her journey, one that doesn’t arrive at any simple or easy conclusion. Much of the latter half of the book is ambiguous, and the reader can arrive at more than one conclusion about Marta. The value of this story, however, is clear: people are flawed, damaged, and searching. Even without consciousness, they are searching for a way out and redemption. How Marta coped with so many situations that were beyond her control is a fascinating glimpse of the resilience of the human spirit.
November 15, 2024
Till Mervas är en gripande och vacker berättelse. Elisabeth Rynell är en författare som jag hade missat, men är glad att ha upptäckt nu. Språket i Till Mervas är finstämt, och med en stor försiktighet och ömhet närmar hon sig bland de värsta händelser man kan råka ut för som förälder. Jag berörs starkt av berättelsen, ångesten och att närma sig acceptans.
Allting är inte utskrivet, utan man får läsa mellan raderna, något som jag tycker om när det utförs skickligt, som i Till Mervas. Det tar ett bra tag innan jag förstår vad som hänt och händer, men det är också så Marta närmar sig frågorna. Hon har råkat ut för saker som hon förträngt, och i Till Mervas genomför hon en mental resa där hon sakta minns. Frågan är om hon även kan acceptera vad som hänt? Jag vet inte om jag tycker om Marta, men jag känner med henne, och hon är vältecknad. Än mer så tycker jag om karaktären Lilldocka och hennes klokskap. Däremot begriper jag mig inte på Kosti, och jag tycker de avslutande scenerna i Mervas blir lite väl mycket.
Marta reser även fysiskt i Till Mervas, och hon är på väg till just Mervas. Jag var tvungen att googla, men det finns ingen ort som heter Mervas. Däremot fick jag tips om en annan by – Laver – som är ett helt övergivet gruvsamhälle i samma stil som bokens Mervas. Själv fick jag samma känsla av beskrivningen i boken som när jag vid ett besök på Svalbard för många år sedan besökte det övergivna stället Pyramiden.
Jag läste Till Mervas som kurslitteratur i kursen Norrland Noir, och seminariet om den var intressant. I min grupp så tyckte vi alla mycket om den. En sak som vi pratade om var huruvida den verkligen utspelar sig i Norrland eller om det kunde vara någon annanstans. För mig handlar det mycket om avstånden, i synnerhet de fysiska, att man åker långa sträckor genom ganska ödsliga bygder. Jag tycker miljöskildringarna är ”norrländska” på ett fint sätt.
Jag letar nu efter boken Hohaj, som jag hittills inte sett i någon second hand (ny verkar den inte finnas). Men skam den som ger sig.
Betyg: 5-
Allting är inte utskrivet, utan man får läsa mellan raderna, något som jag tycker om när det utförs skickligt, som i Till Mervas. Det tar ett bra tag innan jag förstår vad som hänt och händer, men det är också så Marta närmar sig frågorna. Hon har råkat ut för saker som hon förträngt, och i Till Mervas genomför hon en mental resa där hon sakta minns. Frågan är om hon även kan acceptera vad som hänt? Jag vet inte om jag tycker om Marta, men jag känner med henne, och hon är vältecknad. Än mer så tycker jag om karaktären Lilldocka och hennes klokskap. Däremot begriper jag mig inte på Kosti, och jag tycker de avslutande scenerna i Mervas blir lite väl mycket.
Marta reser även fysiskt i Till Mervas, och hon är på väg till just Mervas. Jag var tvungen att googla, men det finns ingen ort som heter Mervas. Däremot fick jag tips om en annan by – Laver – som är ett helt övergivet gruvsamhälle i samma stil som bokens Mervas. Själv fick jag samma känsla av beskrivningen i boken som när jag vid ett besök på Svalbard för många år sedan besökte det övergivna stället Pyramiden.
Jag läste Till Mervas som kurslitteratur i kursen Norrland Noir, och seminariet om den var intressant. I min grupp så tyckte vi alla mycket om den. En sak som vi pratade om var huruvida den verkligen utspelar sig i Norrland eller om det kunde vara någon annanstans. För mig handlar det mycket om avstånden, i synnerhet de fysiska, att man åker långa sträckor genom ganska ödsliga bygder. Jag tycker miljöskildringarna är ”norrländska” på ett fint sätt.
Jag letar nu efter boken Hohaj, som jag hittills inte sett i någon second hand (ny verkar den inte finnas). Men skam den som ger sig.
Betyg: 5-
August 13, 2017
one of the most amazing pieces of written word, anywhere, ever.
December 30, 2022
This book is heavy, just like the ore once hoisted from the abandoned Mervas mine. The prose is elegant, deeply moving, and heart-wrenching all at the same time, and Rynell manages to tackle heavy themes (an abusive father, a dead child, and a lost lover) with grace and aplomb and all over 192 pages. It’s an impressive, though at times exhausting, feat. Just like mining.
June 4, 2018
Wow. I'm not sure what was real and what wasn't by the end, but I loved this book!!! Her writing is just phenomenal. I was riveted. By Marta's horrific story, but also by Ms. Rynell's soothing and impeccable writing style. Is there more?
December 14, 2024
DEEPLY DEEPLY DEEPLY FUCKED UP BOOK, I mean this book will haunt you in. 10 out of 10 recommended. I will write something more coherent once I come back to my senses.
June 30, 2010
Marta is a 50 year old woman with a dark past and an even darker secret, who has lived friendless and alone for many years in an unnamed town in Sweden. She receives a letter from Rosti, her only lover, who she has not heard from in 20 years. Rosti writes only a few lines, but tells Marta that he is in Mervas, a small northern town. Marta, who has little to live for and even less to hang on to, decides to meet him, although she is unsure why she is going to Mervas or what to expect once she does meet Rosti.
The narrative takes the reader back to Marta's childhood, in which her mother was physically and emotionally abused by her husband, her failed relationship with Rosti, and her only child, who was severely disabled. These accounts are painful to read, yet compelling and convincing. Rynell's description of the emotions and outbursts of a new mother who finds out that her newborn son is seriously ill was spot on, as were the brief portrayals of the dismissive and condescending doctors that treated her son.
I found the first half of To Mervas absolutely fascinating, but I lost a bit of interest in the second half, probably due to the unremitting sorrow of Marta's life. Rynell is a poet as well as a novelist, and, accordingly, she carefully chooses her words throughout the book, making it a pleasurable read despite its depressing topics. To Mervas isn't for the faint of heart, but it is a very good psychological novel about the life of a tortured woman.
The narrative takes the reader back to Marta's childhood, in which her mother was physically and emotionally abused by her husband, her failed relationship with Rosti, and her only child, who was severely disabled. These accounts are painful to read, yet compelling and convincing. Rynell's description of the emotions and outbursts of a new mother who finds out that her newborn son is seriously ill was spot on, as were the brief portrayals of the dismissive and condescending doctors that treated her son.
I found the first half of To Mervas absolutely fascinating, but I lost a bit of interest in the second half, probably due to the unremitting sorrow of Marta's life. Rynell is a poet as well as a novelist, and, accordingly, she carefully chooses her words throughout the book, making it a pleasurable read despite its depressing topics. To Mervas isn't for the faint of heart, but it is a very good psychological novel about the life of a tortured woman.
July 23, 2011
Wow, this book took me forever to read! And it was so short!
Main Character Marta has had a traumatic life; he father was abusive to her siblings and her mother, she mistakenly left the only man she's ever truly loved named Kosti, had an unpleasant and divorce, and to top off her grief her only child died at a young age. Marta is so grief stricken by how her life has turned out that she doesn't know how to live; she simply goes through the motions. It isn't until she gets a postcard from her true love Kosti that she decides to make the journey to a place they both dreamed about...Mervas.
The timeline in this book jumped around so you really have to pay attention to what Marta was talking about. The reason it took me so long to finish such a short book was simply that it was depressing. Marta is so full of grief, self pity, and pain, that reading wasn't that enjoyable, but I wanted to finish and see if she ever got to this place called Mervas. This book was also translated from its original Swedish language which was interesting. The scenery description was very visual and the writer really did make you feel and understand Marta's pain. But it was so much that I was just depressed and uninspired to read for long hours. I guess that counts as another reason why I didn't finish this book sooner. Overall is was okay, not something I'd read again thats for sure, but I'm sure I'll remember it.
Main Character Marta has had a traumatic life; he father was abusive to her siblings and her mother, she mistakenly left the only man she's ever truly loved named Kosti, had an unpleasant and divorce, and to top off her grief her only child died at a young age. Marta is so grief stricken by how her life has turned out that she doesn't know how to live; she simply goes through the motions. It isn't until she gets a postcard from her true love Kosti that she decides to make the journey to a place they both dreamed about...Mervas.
The timeline in this book jumped around so you really have to pay attention to what Marta was talking about. The reason it took me so long to finish such a short book was simply that it was depressing. Marta is so full of grief, self pity, and pain, that reading wasn't that enjoyable, but I wanted to finish and see if she ever got to this place called Mervas. This book was also translated from its original Swedish language which was interesting. The scenery description was very visual and the writer really did make you feel and understand Marta's pain. But it was so much that I was just depressed and uninspired to read for long hours. I guess that counts as another reason why I didn't finish this book sooner. Overall is was okay, not something I'd read again thats for sure, but I'm sure I'll remember it.
August 28, 2013
This book is a captivating portrayal of a troubled woman who goes on a spiritual journey to a remote town. The writing is great, describing her innermost thoughts and the scenery with vivid imagery. Her dark secret is hinted at early on and then finally revealed close to the end. The amount of torment and anguish this woman endures is almost a little too much. The ambiguous ending left me with both hope and uncertainty.
December 12, 2016
I remember this book was not what I expected, just that I thought it was a different story. Having spent about an hour reading here and there, I find it beautifully written and I guess I would rate a 4 or 5 if I read it again, just that there are so many other books I want to read so I pass this book on to a friend who likes the writer.
June 9, 2014
(In het Nederlands gelezen.)
Een mooi boek. Een aparte schrijfstijl, soms is het heel intiem, maar soms ook heel afstandelijk. Ik vond het niet altijd duidelijk wanneer een stukje zich afspeelde, want ook heden en verleden wisselden elkaar af.
Het is een boek om lekker rustig te lezen.
Een mooi boek. Een aparte schrijfstijl, soms is het heel intiem, maar soms ook heel afstandelijk. Ik vond het niet altijd duidelijk wanneer een stukje zich afspeelde, want ook heden en verleden wisselden elkaar af.
Het is een boek om lekker rustig te lezen.
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November 1, 2010excellent translation by Victoria Haggblom
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