Categories: books
Date: 26 September 2008 16:45:24
This is another book with a Scandinavian backdrop. I picked it up in my local second-hand bookshop before I went to Denmark but decided not to lug it over there with me in the end.
The novel, translated into English by Joan Tate, was called Anna, Hanna och Johanna in the original Swedish. This probably gives you a good idea of what it's about - i.e. a family saga stretching over three generations. I found Hanna's story the most absorbing of the three. It began in 1871 and depicted a harsh life in a rural part of Sweden. At one point in her story, when she goes to the big town to live with her grown-up daughter, she is amazed at the phenomena of electric light and running water. This underlined just how hard her life had been as there had been no mention of such things in the narrative and I had forgotten that she would have been living a much less luxurious life than I had imagined. Her life wasn't just hard because of a lack of luxury - it was mainly because of certain relationships. Read the book to find out more.
Hanna's story was less interesting and Anna's story was interspersed throughout the narrative... which jumbled my brain a bit because I had to keep remembering which character of the three was the focus. I think it was mainly that their names were so similar. I like to become absorbed in a book and not have to keep jolting myself back to reality to sort out the family tree so this was a slight irritation. I wouldn't recommend that you rush out and buy it, but if you bump into it, you may find it an interesting read.