Malmö letter
At the twilight of his life, BO, 89, lives alone with his dog, Sixten, in a small village in northern Sweden. His wife, Fredrika, suffering from Alzheimer, has lived in nursing homes for three years. In moments of clarity, the old man in declining health rehashing the significant episodes of his existence: his conflicting relationships with his father, a worker in a sawmill like him, his deep friendship with Ture, to whom we have never known any companion, the birth of his son Hans, with whom communication is difficult … between the visits of household aids, Bo is fighting to keep his life and his dog, Take care.
Here, in summary, the frame of The cranes fly south (“The cranes fly south”, not translated): a first novel by Lisa Ridzén on the theme of old age which has experienced an unexpected journey, deeply touching the Swedish readers. Released in January 2024, the book has passed in more than 190,000 copies (paper and audio), in a country of ten million inhabitants, shaken by a reading crisis, where 5,000 copies sold – excluding thriller – are enough to make success in bookstores. That’s not all: crowned “Book of the Year” by readers, at the Göteborg Book Fair, in September 2024, the novel has already been sold in more than thirty countries. In Germany, nine publishing houses participated in the auction to acquire the rights.
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