SVINALÄNGORNA – BEYOND
By Susanna Alakoski
LEENA HAS TWO best friends. Åse is the only one she knows who doesn’t have a father who drinks, but her mother uses to get drunk so it evens itself out. Riitta’s dad is drunk almost every day.
A RECENTLY BUILT housing area in Ystad is filled with families of immigrants and low-income earners during the 60s. To Leena and her Finnish parents, the new apartment is a total luxury: three rooms, a balcony, parquet flooring. But the locals quickly start calling the neighbourhood “The Pigsties”.
THE REDDISH-YELLOW three floored houses become a collective place for Susanna Alakoski’s novel about Leena. Clear-eyed and fast-paced, she tells the story about herself, her parents, their neighbours and all the hilarious and drastic events that take place around her. But the laughter sticks in your throat when the real nature of this childhood portrayal is revealed.
LEENA, HER SIBLINGS, and her friends are thrown between periods of apparent tidiness and complete chaos. This is their moving story about social class, children’s vulnerability and their capacity to survive.
ABOUT THE BOOK
First published by Albert Bonnier, Sweden 2006
RIGHTS SOLD TO
Albania, SHKUPI Publishing House
Denmark, Gyldendal
Finland, WSOY
Germany, Verlag Edition Fünf
Macedonia, Feniks Publishing House
Serbia, Heliks
Sweden, Albert Bonnier
REVIEWS
It is a depiction of class that stings – certainly. But also, I think, a portrait of an era that manages to be as clear as it is timeless – magnificent.
– Kulturnyheterna
Without the author’s sharp powers of observation and disarming humour, this book would be unbearable to read – instead, Beyond has become one of the most captivating and entertaining novels I have read in many years.
– Svenska Dagbladet
A novel about class, integrity and gender that has long been called for in contemporary Swedish literature.
– Göteborgs-Posten
Beyond could have become just another in a line of social misery novels, shaped by worthy and correct ideas – but through its biting realism and skilfully executed child’s perspective, Susanna Alakoski avoids all clichés. The literary Ystad will never be the same again.
– Aftonbladet
BOOKS
Fiction
