Book description
It is 1989 and all over Europe Communism is crumbling. Arvid Jansen is
in the throes of a divorce. At the same time, his mother is diagnosed
with cancer. Over a few intense autumn days, we follow Arvid as he
struggles to find a new footing in his life, while everything around him
is changing at staggering speed. As he attempts to negotiate the
present, he remembers holidays on the beach with his brothers, his early
working life devoted to Communist ideals, courtship, and his
relationship with his tough, independent mother - a relationship full of
distance and unspoken pain that is central to Arvid's life. Per
Petterson was born in Oslo in 1952 and worked for several years as an
unskilled labourer, a bookseller, a writer and a translator until he
made his literary debut in 1987 with the short-story collection
Ashes in my Mouth, Sand in my Shoes,
which was widely acclaimed by critics. He made his literary
breakthrough in 2003 with the novel Out Stealing Horses
, which has been translated into 40 languages so far and won many
prizes, including the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and the Independent
Foreign Fiction Prize.
