LIGAN – THE PIONEERS: A SISTERHOOD OF CHANGE
By Fatima Bremmer
SMART, BRAVE AND IRRESISTIBLE. A group of women in Stockholm decide to challenge male domination. They move between hectic newspaper offices, royal dinners and war zones. This is the beginning of their pioneering exploits and a dizzying journey through 20th century Sweden. It is a story about lifelong friendships, about carrying each other through sickness, infidelity, forbidden love and abuse.
AFTER THE AUGUST PRIZE-WINNING Life in Every Breath, Fatima Bremmer is back with a gripping collective biography of a radical group of friends who paved the way for radical change in society.
THIS IS THE story of a group of women who changed history forever. They called themselves The Pioneers – Blood Sisters of the Klara Quarter, and they were invincible.
ABOUT THE BOOK
First published by Forum, Sweden 2025
RIGHTS SOLD TO
Sweden, Forum
REVIEWS
A rare feat of combined narrative delight and historical accuracy.
– Expressen
What Fatima Bremmer does, in this doctoral thesis turned collective biography, is to breathe life into their black-and-white studio portraits as well and pave the way for a new historiography, in which more feminist pioneers can take their rightful place.
– Svenska Dagbladet
Bremmer writes vividly about the Klara quarter of that time, the bohemian newspaper quarter that never slept.
– Dagens Nyheter
Fatima Bremmer, who won the August Prize 2017 for her biography Life in Every Breath about Ester Blenda Nordström, has done it again. The Pioneers is a poignant and emotional book about these colourful personalities moving in the special time of social change that characterised Sweden.
– BTJ
What an amazing group the Pioneers were, and how much they all achieved. What’s more, they seem to have had a whole lot of fun together along the way. It is precisely this sense of social vitality that is so powerfully captured in Fatima Bremmer’s lively, intelligent and informative book.
– Dagens Nyheter
There is a light in the darkness: collectivisation, cooperation and sisterhood. Despite the women fighting over jobs and article ideas, they manage to stick together. […] It is a beautifully described camaraderie that, at a time when journalism is being dismantled by authoritarian rulers around the world, is worth reviving.
– Göteborgs-Posten
The historically investigative journalist and author Fatima Bremmer has […] returned with a research effort of divine grace. One just wants to say: THANK YOU! Thank you for such a fascinating read. Fatima Bremmer has written the instructive, magnificent, vibrant and gripping collective novel The Pioneers in a sympathetic, descriptive prose style and with empathetic portraits.
– Västerbottens-Kuriren
Fatima Bremmer writes in a lively and captivating style, conjuring up images of places and people and peppering her work with a series of cliffhangers that make the book difficult to put down. Don’t miss The Pioneers. This gang is full of spark.
– Länstidningen Östersund
BOOKS
Non Fiction
