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2020 Longlist

Hotel Silence

Translated from the Icelandic by Brian FitzGibbon

ABOUT
THE BOOK

On the cusp of turning fifty and divorced, Jónas Ebeneser who has recently discovered he is not the biological father of his daughter, Gudrun Waterlily, has sunk into an existential crisis, losing all will to live. As he visits his senile mother in a nursing home, he secretly muses on how, when, and where to put himself out of his misery.

To prevent his only daughter from discovering his body, Jónas decides it’s best to die abroad. He flies to an unnamed country where the fumes of war still hover in the air. He books a room at the sparsely occupied Hotel Silence, in a small town riddled with landmines and the aftershocks of violence, and there he comes to understand the depths of other people’s scars while beginning to see his wounds in a new light.

 

 

ABOUT
THE AUTHOR Auður
Ava Ólafsdóttir

Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir is a novelist, playwright and poet and also a lyricist for the Icelandic performance pop band Milkywhale. Her novels have been translated into over 25 languages, and they include Butterflies in November and Hotel Silence which won among others the Nordic Council Literature Prize, and the Icelandic Literary Prize. Auður Ava lives in Reykjavik.

Auður Ava Ólafsdóttir is a novelist, playwright and poet and also a lyricist for the Icelandic performance pop band Milkywhale. Her novels have been translated into over 25 languages, and they include Butterflies in November and Hotel Silence which won among others the Nordic Council Literature Prize, and the Icelandic Literary Prize. Auður Ava lives in Reykjavik.

NOMINATING LIBRARY COMMENTS

A quiet but utterly engaging tale, told in Ólafsdóttir’s signature spare and brilliantly charming prose. Reykjavík City Library, Iceland

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Country
Iceland
Original Language
Icelandic
Publisher
Pushkin Press
Translator
Brian FitzGibbon
Translation
Translated from the Icelandic by Brian FitzGibbon

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