Although this is a novel, it feels more like a play. In two "Scenes" the author is transported to a cafe in a small town in N Norway, in the (1920s?)
Owner Mrs Krane must manage while her husband's away, assisted by a couple of waitresses. And as a "situation" begins to develop between her "regulars", she and the staff listen in with increasing horror.....
Separated dressmaker, Katinks Stordal, seems to have abandoned her work (and her two teens) to the demon drink....the local ladies are becoming frantic for their unfinished ballgowns...and she falls in with a disreputable, lonely harbour hand...in Mrs Krane's parlour!
Meanwhile her ex husband drops in...and various others who have more linking them together than we at first dreamed.
You feel a kind of Greek chorusof sententious old gossips is looking on and passing comment throughout.
Put me much in mind of an Ibsen play- a (just slightly) implausible plotline, but strong on characters and action. ( )