Kristín Ómarsdóttir

Vala Thorodds

A wild adventure... Ómarsdóttir's novel is kaleidoscopic; the more you look at it, the more you see.

One of the most original authors in contemporary Icelandic literature...known for subverting traditional binaries like fantasy and realism, feminine and masculine, good and evil, and the animal and the human.

One of [this country's] most respected authors.

Kristín is a singular author...she is in a league of her own.

Kristín does everything at once - enchants, terrifies, devastates and delights.

She approaches taboos with complete irreverence, as if they don't hinder her at all.

With enchanting style and perfect conviction Kristín leads the reader into a dreamworld that is so lifelike that we don't know whether we are in a bad dream or a terrifying nightmare.

A many-layered novel that immediately grips the reader... makes us think about what it is to be human and the borders that people invent to distinguish themselves from others and to trap themselves.

An examination of humanity and of language - man's most distinctive feature - and how it serves us in defining ourselves and the world around us.

'Magical and disturbing' Adam Thirlwell 
 
An astonishing, mind-bending novel about a woman discovering a community of swan-people from one of Iceland's greatest writers. 
 
*SHORTLISTED FOR THE ICELANDIC WOMEN'S LITERATURE PRIZE* 
 
In the not-too-distant future, a young spy named Elísabet Eva is about to discover something that will upend her life. 
 
Elísabet likes to take long solitary walks near the lake. One day, she sees two creatures emerging from the water, half-human, half-swan. She follows them through tangles of thickets into a strange new reality. 
 
Pulled into the monomaniacal, and often violent, quest of the swanfolk, Elísabet finds her own mind increasingly untrustworthy. Soon, she is forced to reckon with the consequences of her involvement with these unusual beings, and a past life she has been trying to evade. 
 
'Ómarsdottir's skills as a poet and playwright are evident' Helen Oyeyemi, New York Review of Books

Kristín Ómarsdóttir

Praise for Swanfolk

'Magical and disturbing' Adam Thirlwell

A wild adventure... Ómarsdóttir's novel is kaleidoscopic; the more you look at it, the more you see.

One of the most original authors in contemporary Icelandic literature...known for subverting traditional binaries like fantasy and realism, feminine and masculine, good and evil, and the animal and the human.

'Magical and disturbing' Adam Thirlwell

A wild adventure... Ómarsdóttir's novel is kaleidoscopic; the more you look at it, the more you see.

One of the most original authors in contemporary Icelandic literature...known for subverting traditional binaries like fantasy and realism, feminine and masculine, good and evil, and the animal and the human.

'Magical and disturbing' Adam Thirlwell

A wild adventure... Ómarsdóttir's novel is kaleidoscopic; the more you look at it, the more you see.

One of the most original authors in contemporary Icelandic literature...known for subverting traditional binaries like fantasy and realism, feminine and masculine, good and evil, and the animal and the human.

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