Sissel Endresen
Art and design

Here are some words about the book - I may be a little incompetent, but I mean what I mean:

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This is a beautiful, sore and thought-provoking novel about the good, the difficult and the unpredictable life - about hopes, dreams, obstacles, power, powerlessness, love and what really matters. All the assessments, questions, openness, warmth, interest and freedom of prejudice in the book testify to great depth.

Technically, I think the book has particularly beautiful sentences, a very interesting and varied language and form of expression, a surprising, very well adapted and a rewarding use of adjectives and adverbs. To create life in the text, a suitable number of entertaining, fun and sometimes sad digressions have been added.

It alternates between direct speech, past, present and letter form. The character gallery is well attuned to the length of the book, and good insight is given into the thoughts, stories and opinions of the various characters. Øivind shows with solid grip a big difference in how these characters formulate themselves, what sociolect they have, where they are from and in what mood they are in.

The book appears to be genuine and holistic. The stories that are told are thought-provoking, profound, interesting and vivid. They have left their mark on me.