Swanfolk

by Kristín Ómarsdóttir, Vala Thorodds (Translator)

Like a modern Midsummer Night’s Dream, an ethereal and haunting novel about a young spy who enchanted by a species of half-swan, half-human creatures—an obsession that ultimately leads her to question her own existence—and sanity.

In the not-too-distant future, a young spy named Elísabet Eva finds herself mentally unraveling following an assignment in Paris. Everything in Elísabet’s life in the city—her friends, social engagements, and late nights—revolved around her work as a spy with the Special Unit. To regain her mental balance, Elísabet finds herself taking long solitary walks near the lake.

One day, she sees two strange beasts emerging from the water—a pair of seemingly mythical creatures, human woman above the waist, swan below. Curious, she follows them through tangles of thickets to a clearing . . . and into a strange new reality.

Elísabet’s walks become regular visits to these swan women. As she earns their trust, the creatures reveal the enigma of their secret existence and their desire to reproduce. Pulled further and further into the swanfolk’s monomaniacal (and often violent) quest, Elísabet finds her own mind growing increasingly untrustworthy. Ultimately, she is forced to reckon with both the consequences of her involvement with these unusual beings and her own past—and face a truth she’s carefully tried to evade.

Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, Magical Realism, Contemporary, Literary Fiction, Retellings, Audiobook

240 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2019

About the author

Kristín grew up in Hafnarfjörður. She studied Literature and Spanish at the University of Iceland, then pursued Spanish at the Universities of Barcelona and Copenhagen. She has published poetry, novels, short stories and plays.
Her first publication was the poetry book Í húsinu okkar er þoka (There is Fog in Our House) in 1987, and her first novel, Svartir brúðarkjólar (Black Wedding Dresses) came out in 1992.
Kristín has won many awards for her work, including the DV Cultural Prize for Literature for her 1998 novel Elskan mín ég dey (I Will Die, my Love).
Kristín has worked with other artists, such as the photographer Nanna Bisp Büchert, with whom she produced the book Sérstakur dagur (Special Day), in which poetry and photographs work together. She has also collaborated with Haraldur Jónsson on the film The Secret Lives of Icelanders.

Reviews

[Roman Clodia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Within me slept a desire to disconnect from this day and age even as I surrendered to its siren song and dutifully played my part as a disciple of its staggering mechanism - whose charms, however, did not conceal the fact that its temptations led one unequivocally to destruction.

This is a beguilingly strange narrative with a dream-like feel, the prose lit with bright colours throughout ('I came from a country that did not exist and lived from birth in its capital, by a blue bay and a violet mountain whose slopes were scaled by a verdurous green in summer and in winter were veiled by snow'), and where the uncannily strange and the everyday become inextricably intertwined.

Did I always know how to make rational sense of this book? No - but I was wooed by its strangeness and the play of images that activated all kinds of sub-rational ideas in my head. With themes (I think) of gender, trauma, power, resistance, retreat and recuperation, this works fascinatingly at a kind of archetypal level. Not one for readers who want 'reality' and a logical narrative of progression and clarity, this works more like liberatory poetry that frees the imagination.

Many thanks to Random House/Vintage for an ARC via NetGalley.

[Liz • りず · Rating 4 out of 5]

“A book that isn’t about anything never disappoints you. Books that search for a conclusion and closure are at risk of disappointing their readers. Conclusions dampen the impulse to innovate and to imagine.”
🦢🪶🕵🏻‍♀️
An enchanting and unsettling tale about a young spy who becomes obsessed with a species of half-swan, half-human beings--an infatuation that eventually causes her to doubt her own reality and sanity. With all the whimsical charm of an old European fairy tale, Swanfolk explores the absurdities of modern society, language, and gender identity through a dream-like lense. At once eccentric, mysterious, and thrilling.

[J.C. · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of the disadvantages of living on a small island is that I don’t often get the opportunity, when buying books, to pick them up in a bookshop, open them and read the first few paragraphs to ascertain if I like the style and so on. I usually have to buy online, and in a Blackwells’ newsletter my eye caught the ethereal illustration on the front cover of this book. As it turns out, it’s an artistic incorporation of three different photographs, and it’s a bit of a wild goose chase (sorry!), also perhaps a swan song as regards my relationship with Kristín Ómarsdóttir, who is without doubt a gifted author but who is pictured on the back cover giving rather a fearsome-looking glare, perhaps supposed to be indicative of depth but conveying to me an uncompromising superiority.

Swanfolk! What is it about swans that we are drawn to? Surely their elegant necks, their demeanour, their apparent gliding across the water, their white stillness in a winter landscape of snow and ice? The calm, elegant, mysterious front cover illustration was soon turned on its head as the swanfolk in this story have only the lower part of their body in swan form (the dumpy, hard-paddling bit) and their top halves are human – and very earthy human animals they are. Let me warn you, there are a lot of worms on the menu.

So there’s nothing elegant about much of this book. I had to work hard to appreciate its jarring episodes of violence and its fragmentary eccentricities. It wasn’t until I read the last few chapters a second time that I could begin to appreciate some sort of shape to it. The swanfolk poke at and disrupt the highly controlled, totalitarian life of the “country that didn’t exist”, their intrusion at least in the mind of the protagonist, Elísabet Eva, and the sudden eruptions of eccentricity and violence engendered by her relationship with the swanfolk symbolise the breaking of her role and identity within the carefully monitored framework imposed upon her. Many things break, the most apparently meaningful being the egg of the swanfolk – but I mustn’t say too much about what story there was.

I think the translator, Vala Thorodds, must have done a wonderful job on this, especially as the language is highly poetic, but despite that I feel that much of the strength and artistry of the book must lie hidden from me in the original Icelandic. Snatches of poetry propel the narrative, on the surface meaningless, but possibly essential birdfood in some deeper layer of perception among the swans, which passed me by. The one verse that did strike me as powerful was this, which Elísabet repeated to herself at one of her lowest moments:

And nearly I had lost my wits
and still my sense is fazed –
should faerie folk turn foe, your soul
shall not soon be saved.
Leave all birds be,
Leave all birds be! In the spring.

The narrative knocks about alarmingly and the birds themselves indulge in apparently irrational behaviour that points Elísabet to the door marked “Exit” from her narrowed, scraped existence. Is it all for her? Is it all in her head? As a critique of totalitarian society the book would fail; as a poetic, or personal, epitaph it works, weirdly, but without permanence, trust or even sense. And I haven’t even told you what emerges from Elísabet’s kitchen chandelier, while she’s tucking into her sausages.

[hawk · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think this was the second time I started reading this novel, but I can't remember what happened the first time.

for the first half of the book I still felt abit ambivalent about the novel - i both enjoyed it and didn't, found it both interesting and unengaging...

I'm not entirely sure what it was about it that I didn't enjoy it/connect with it/get into it more... 🤔

and I'm equally unsure what it was that turned that around part way thru, when I suddenly found myself enjoying it greatly! 😃
🙂🙃🙂


❄


the story and characters were difficult to place, wrt location and time. I think this is likely deliberately so. but initially I think I wanted abit more of a foundation to set loose from, wrt the different realities.
tho it maybe created a good sense of dislocation/disconnect/disorientation...

🦢 "we don't know where we come from originally" 🦢

(the Swanfolk)

and there was a nicely created slightly dystopian sense of social control throughout... which was also abit (menacingly) vague... 🙂🙃🙂😯

while alot of the story and its telling felt quite whimsical, the novel contains quite alot of real violence. it's possible the layer of remove from feeling alot of the violence more fully as a reader might have been the kinda remove seemingly experienced and embodied by the main character, our narrator 🤔


❄


💖 I very much enjoyed the stories within stories aspects to the novel and it's own story 🙂💖

📙 the centrality of creation stories, mythologies, folklore, gods and goddesses, extinct species... and an exploration of psychologies, truth(s) 🙂🙃

📗 the perspective brought by the chapter about the content of the library book the Swan had been reading 😃 including the investigation into its library readers/borrowers. I loved this story within the story 🙂 and I wondered how much it mirrored the story too 🤔
(chapter 24, 'The Diamond Reserve')

📘 and then chapter 36, 'Invigilation' - another book within the book, that kinda describes the book 😉😁


❄


there were strong recurring themes of :

🌟 dentistry!?! 🦷🔧🛠⛏

🌟 flight 🙂 human and animal 🙂🐦🦆🦅🦉🦇🕊🦢 and birds - the swans, the golden plover (marking a season), ravens mentioned, and others... 💙🖤

🌟 and reproduction, being with child, and/or being childless...
the dwindling of the Swanfolk population, the egg...
the cost of children - emotional and physical, awa financial...

❄

some other things I enjoyed included...

🦢 the Swanfolk and Elisabet discuss the nature of truth 🙂 and lies... ...and mourning customs 🙂

🐶 and I liked the recurrence of Rex the imaginary dog - reference to him always seemed well timed wrt having ALMOST forgotten about him, and the timely reminders made me smile 🙂😉 I also liked him as a character in his own right, and as an aspect of the main character 😃


🌟 🌟 🌟 🌟 4.5 🤍


accessed as a library audiobook, read by Sofia Engstrand 🦢

[Tommi · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book that isn’t about anything never disappoints you. Books that search for a conclusion and closure are at risk of disappointing their readers. Conclusions dampen the impulse to innovate and to imagine.

Swanfolk was very much to my liking. It’s filled with imagination and dream-like states that defy logic and keep the reader alert (think of Can Xue but a little more approachable), yet it comes with a sense of humor, along with feminism and meta-level commentary. One of my favorite reads of the year so far.

If the ocean dries up, the fish die – if all land is submerged in the sea, the land animals die. The land of the goddesses – the psychic domain – disappeared under a flood of humanity, or a flood of human culture. Each person can easily eradicate from their mind, by filling it, the psychic space that ought to be kept free for spiritual reflection and meditation, dreams, epiphanies, and changes and influences to one’s mentality.

[Nicole Murphy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I was really enjoying the first half of this but then into the second half it just became so convoluted and confusing.

[Amy Noelle]

DNF @ 26%. I don’t know if it is an issue with translation or this is what the author intended but the wording is so bizarre to the point of being irritating for me to read. The dialogue between characters is so strange! People just don’t talk like that. I could get behind the swanfolk talking odd because they are half birds, it would be understandable I guess. But EVERYONE? I don’t get it. I tried powering through but when it comes to writing I don’t vibe with I just can’t.

watch my reading vlog here: https://youtu.be/F4QiQAprWT8

Thanks so much to Harpervia and Netgalley for the digital arc 🖤

[imogen · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 rounded up.

this book tried to be a lot of things and thus didn’t quite manage to be anything. is it a fever dream about half swan people kidnapping a spy? is it a personification of philosophical concepts? is it just insufferable? do we need to know?

i think this book would be perfect for someone but that someone isn’t me sadly.

[Maryna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Imagine in the not-to-distant future, someone like Hieronimus Bosch will be born. And the technology available at that time will allow people to walk into his paintings or maybe even right into his imagination. This is what it felt like to me reading this book.

[Ceallaigh · Rating 5 out of 5]

“‘…I’m reading a book about nothing, the effect of which is similar to that of wandering about town. Aren’t you especially fond of roaming about town?’ …Jakob knocked on the book. ‘A book that isn’t about anything never disappoints you. Books that search for a conclusion and closure are at risk of disappointing their readers. Conclusions dampen the impulse to innovate and to imagine.’ Jakob knocked on the book.”

TITLE—Swanfolk (Isl. Svanafólkið)
AUTHOR—Kristín Ómarsdóttir
TRANSLATOR—Vala Thorodds
PUBLISHED—orig. 2019, trans. 2022
PUBLISHER—HarperVia (an imprint of HarperCollins)

GENRE—speculative fiction; literary fiction; fabulism; dystopian sci-fi
SETTING—Iceland “in the near future”
MAIN THEMES/SUBJECTS—imagination as refuge, technocratic paternalism, legacy & heritage, swans & plovers & gulls, Iceland, the source of value, off-the-page OCD (/general ND /poss. Autism), absurdism vs existentialism, teeth, guilt & responsibility & regret, isolation & “safety”, refugee & immigration politics, communication: conversation & language, human complexity as inherently chaotic and resistant to social- or state-regulation, fairy tales, AI, mirrors & reflections, deviance & conformity, surrealism?, even a few gothic tropes!

WRITING STYLE—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
CHARACTERS—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/⭐️
STORY/PLOT—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

BONUS ELEMENT/S—Was excited to find lots of similarities to Helen Oyeyemi’s style & themes but still uniquely done by this author.

PHILOSOPHY—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/⭐️
PREMISE—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/⭐️
EXECUTION—⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

“Thoughts intruded and changed nothing. Time had not opened my eyes to aspects of my actions beyond those I could justify, and my thinking didn’t see straight. Dear thought, I asked my thought, surprise me and take the reins, because if she who holds the whip is left in charge, you, dear thoughts, will never wake me to awareness. Please open my eyes and show me another way—or else lead me astray.”

My thoughts:
This book was wildddd. It took me a little bit to get into it but once I sort of grounded myself in both the story and the writing style, I was absolutely obsessed with it. I also do not quite know how to talk about it other than to say that whatever it is that Oyeyemi (my number one fave) does in her books that I love so much is what I found to a very similar degree in Ómarsdóttir’s book. But beyond that…

I feel like trying to talk about, dissect, or analyze a book like this almost contradicts the project of the book itself and certainly I feel like my words could never accurately describe the experience of actually reading this book. It has been heavily panned on various review sites with the most popular accompanying text saying something along the lines of: “I have no idea what I just read” or “No idea what was going on in this book” so if plot is important to you, there is one, kind of, but you may not even notice it and it certainly won’t be what propels you through Ómarsdóttir’s exquisitely arresting and mercilessly insightful prosework. (And that gothic twist towards the end. 😚👌🏻)

It’s also important to know going in that this is speculative fiction / dystopian sci-fi so people coming for your classic modern fairy tale retelling vibes, that’s going to trip up your ability to get into the story on its own terms—just a heads up.

I would recommend this book to fans of Helen Oyeyemi’s work. Would especially love to know your thoughts on this one! This book is best read sober. 🤣 (🫵🏼😐)

Final note: Ultimately this is a book that I’ll have to reread to be sure of my thoughts on and interpretation of but that is a task I am very much looking forward to undertaking. 🙏🏻

“How the night was good, and better than I. ‘Thank you, night,’ I whispered and wrapped myself in the duvet, imagined that I hung lifeless in a net made of spiders silk.”

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

CW // blood, body horror, ableism & gaslighting (internalized & external), rape, suicide, forced institutionalization, graphic: forced gynecological surgery (Please feel free to DM me for more specifics!)

Further Reading—
- Helen Oyeyemi
- Oyeyemi, Helen (13 April 2012). "Under Siege". New York Times Sunday Book Review.
- A WILD WINTER SWAN, by Gregory Maguire
- LAST RITUALS, by Yrsa Sigurðardóttir
- THE YELLOW WALLPAPER, by Charlotte Gilman-Perkins
- Dystopian sci-fi vibes
- Italo Calvino or Milan Kundera maybe
- also Tom Robbins? maybe?

[Fran · Rating 2 out of 5]

Extremely rare occurrence…I DNF this book. Gorgeous cover, interesting premise….but completely indecipherable. Every character was unlikeable,, with no development. I kept looking for meaning in the segues and interactions and found none. Perhaps something was lost in the translation. Time is too short to waste reading something that inspired utter boredom and disinterest

[Louise · Rating 3 out of 5]

There's probably some deeper meaning to this book that went right over my head. This happens.
However, I enjoyed it for what it was.... strange.
It's quite a short book, and that helped to just go with the flow and not try to work out what it COULD mean.
It's a bit fairy tale like, and other wordly.
Interesting, but not one I'll ever be able to explain.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a stunning novel. Omarsdottir is a poet and playwright, as well as a novelist—and it’s the poet who wrote this book. Sharp as ice, every word, and like looking through ice at the world, too, as we proceed through this dream-reality of a psychological hall of mirrors. The swanbroads are just so perfectly drawn, it’s hard to imagine living in a world where such women don’t live down by the river or paddle out on the lake. Some of the scenes in this book are hard to take—there’s violence of various sorts, and it’s blunt. But it’s also a sweet pain, as the story and the language are what I live to read.

[Ann · Rating 1 out of 5]

I am scratching my head and asking "what the hell did I just read??"
This book makes absolutely no sense, even taking into consideration it is the rambling of an insane person...the nicest thing I can say is "HUH?"
The honest thing I can say is what a waste of my time to read it and too bad they wasted so much paper to publish it.
TRASH BIN WORTHY
(so bad it doesn't even rate a 1 star)

[Jared Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dear time, I beg you

not

to watch over me

or cure me of shame.

[Amy ☁️ (tinycl0ud) · Rating 3 out of 5]

“A book that isn’t about anything never disappoints you. Books that search for a conclusion and closure are at risk of disappointing their readers.”

In spite of the quote above I am glad to say that there is linear progression towards a conclusion in this wacky story. This was my first foray into Icelandic literature and I don’t really know what to make of it. The story felt like if Kafka had an acid trip and decided to rewrite Orwell’s ‘1984’ but weirder and funnier. That’s the best way I can describe it. The characters are prone to getting into lengthy philosophical dialogues and they very much are stand-ins for big ideas or positions to take in society. This book requires a lot of focus to remain coherent because of the surreal setting and disjointed prose, which is not to say that I didn’t enjoy the challenge. I’m just not sure there’s a pay off.

In a dystopian, unnameable, totalitarian country, Elisabet works a job in a special governmental unit that does “anthropological investigations as well as security matters.” She’s orphaned, single, childless, and alludes frequently to some prior training that makes her not have emotions (or so it seems). She takes long walks and one day, she comes across a flock (?) of swanfolk who are human on top and swans below. Funnily, she gets herself evaluated for hallucinations. No luck—she’s cerebrally sound and these creatures are real. They’re temperamental, one moment accepting and the next moment violent, but she keeps going back.

One day, they send her an egg to incubate, forcing her to explain the situation to her boss (they have a weird relationship) and colleagues. For reasons unknown to her, she gets fired and then arrested and put in solitary confinement where she steadily loses her grip on sanity. Then overnight, she is reinstated, given a promotion, and asked to procure more eggs, given that she is only person who is able to see them. In the end, something is done to her and she is thrust back into human society, exiled and orphaned anew, with all her prior relationships damaged in some way.

[Alex · Rating 2 out of 5]

I reeeeeeally struggled with this book. The two stars that are here are for the mysterious premise of the swanfolk, which piqued my interest immediately, and also for the prose, which is gorgeous at times.

But as the book went on.... I honestly have no idea what I was even really reading. It just seemed like a series of largely unconnected ideas, I'm not sure what was real, what was a dream, what was imagined, what was just abstract, I have no idea what the actual plot was meant to be - the blurb mentions Elisabet reckoning with "a past life she has been trying to evade" and I have no idea what that is in reference to at all. A lot of people have also mentioned the book dealing with feminism, which also went entirely over my head - where was the feminism, or even any mention of gender politics??

Maybe it's a deficiency of the reader (ie me) but I just could not get anything at all from this book, beyond some nice prose that's utterly devoid of any narrative meaning.

[Jim · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rather enigmatic read. No discernable plot, no clear indication whether it is a dream or reality, for me anyway. "Wiki-profundities" abound (to explain: theoretically thought-provoking statements that, pre-internet, would be significant or notable or repeatable, but now, in 2025, merely indicate the author has access to all the same search engines as the rest of us, which therefore make the phrases feel empty and useless, or at least patronizing or condescending). An easy book to get through, but not one I could recommend. Wanted more of the fantasy-swanfolk, less of the Orwellian Iceland silliness.
Meh.

[Richard Swan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wow. This is an odd one. Bought for its title, but by any standards this Icelandic novel is surreal. A woman who works for a shadowy government ministry discovers a race of half-swan, half-human creatures. Nobody else can detect them, until they contribute an egg which hatches; the swan/human hybrid chick/child is kept at the zoo.

OK, that’s the normal stuff. After that it gets weird.

2023 Thumbnail Review #66 Swanfolk by Kristin Omarsdottir

[Taina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Nyt oli outoa! Ostin tämän kirjan Reykjavikista lokakuun alussa, koska halusin lukea jotain paikallista. En tiennyt, että joudun johonkin hämmentävän häiritsevään todellisuuteen, jossa irtoaa hampaita, keltaista, sinistä ja punaista löytyy yllättävistä paikoista, ihmisten nimet vaihtuvat kesken lauseiden ja joutsenihmiset neulovat. Symboliikkaa oli paljon ja tulkinnanvaraisuus tapissa. Olen edelleen hämmästynyt enkä tiedä mitä luin. Suosittelen, jos haluat pään pyörälle.

[Sara Hlín · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ákvað að lesa þessa eftir að hafa heyrt góðar umsagnir um hana en hef áður gefist upp á bók eftir Kristínu. Úff. Mér er fyrirmunað að skilja af hverju Kristín á svona stóran áhangendahóp. Hverju er ég ekki að ná hér? Kristín er augljóslega mjög fær í íslensku máli og að setja saman fallegan texta en söguþráðurinn, samhengið og súrrealisminn er ofar mínum skilningi. Fannst sumar setningarnar bara alls ekki meika neinn sens. Svona eins og eitthvað sem vellur upp úr barni í óráði. Langar að skilja en það virðist ekki vera á mínu færi.

[Yvette · Rating 1 out of 5]

I am not one to not finish a book, this may be the first. I just could not get into it. I’m not sure if it’s the translation or wording or what. I was just so confused.

[Ella (book.monkey) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Too many feelings, but I suppose the best way to describe my feelings towards this book was I've covered it in so many notes and highlights that if I ever wanted someone else to read it I would have to buy them their own copy

[Lucy Haslam · Rating 4 out of 5]

(3.8) constantly feels like getting your legs (or flippers) taken out from under you - love the erratic unstable quality - but it doesn’t quite come together at the end

[Kuu · Rating 2 out of 5]

im sorry i simply do not get it

[rae · Rating 5 out of 5]

For 229 pages you will lose your mind, then find it only to lose it again, and you will love every second of it

[Leah Wingenroth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hey so........what. (2.5 rounded up to 3)

[Nata · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have no idea what I've just read but it was brilliant!!!

[Charlotte · Rating 3 out of 5]

In a dystopian future a government spy discovers that there are swan people living in the fringes of the town. I honestly don't know how to review this novel; the story is like nothing I've ever read before and was more than a little strange but I was oddly drawn to it and had to finish the novel to see what happens,


Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of the novel in exchange for an honest review.

[M · Rating 2 out of 5]

Frankly, this is a very odd book. I'm not sure if the author is writing something avant-garde, or if the translation has altered the book, because the text is stilted, the pace is too slow (for me, anyway), and the story (metaphor? fairy tale?) did not hold my interest for long.