Johannes Anyuru
Author of They Will Drown in Their Mothers' Tears
About the Author
Image credit: 2010-09-26 at Göteborg Book Fair.
Works by Johannes Anyuru
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Birthdate
- 1979-03-23
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- Sweden
- Birthplace
- Borås, Sweden
- Associated Place (for map)
- Borås, Sweden
Members
Reviews
I know you don’t want to believe this can happen in the country where you and your children are living. My parents didn’t want to either.
A harrowing story about an Islamic terrorist attack on a Swedish comic book store (called Hondo in the book and clearly based on the Charlie Hebdo attack) and the subsequent rise of anti-immigrant, anti-Islamic fascism in Sweden, including black sites where “enemies of Sweden” are illegally detained and tortured. A very difficult read, especially at show more this moment in history in the USA, but an important one. The writing is beautiful—one of the first-person narrators is a poet—but still so painful and awful. One of the terrorists survives and is held at a criminal psychiatric clinic. She asks to meet with the poet, who decides he may write a book about the attack.
The terrorist believes she has come from the future, or from an alternate timeline, and the device of comparing one possible future to its seeds in the present is an effective one. It’s only the middle of January, but I already know this will be one of the best books I read this year.
“We read about genocide and stuff in school, but it was all about how sad it was for everyone who’d been subjected to it, not what happened to those who did the killing, how they’d destroyed their words, and everything that gave life meaning. We learned nothing about the emptiness.”
“‘Whatever happens, I want you to remember one thing,’ she said. Rain clouds had gathered in dark blue and black layers behind her, and between us was something that had to do with God, but also with two people at this point in history, two Muslims in Sweden, seventeen years after the attack on Hondo’s, and she reached out and touched my cheek and the wind picked up and her smile frightened me. ‘Remember,’ she said. ‘We are a love poem.’”show less
A beautiful and heartbreaking story of an Islamic terrorist and the writer who interviews her. The girl, who sabotaged her own mission to blow up a comic book store, has been identified as a Belgian who converted to Islam for her boyfriend, but she claims to be from another reality in which the bombing does occur and leads Sweden down an extreme path of repression against Muslims. As she presents her history to the writer, he begins to suspect she may not be crazy and, in fact, offers him an show more alternative way forward with his life. . Told through her writings and his inner perspective. One of those rare books that sound depressing and painful but end up being life- and love-affirming. 4.5/5 stars. show less
This book is an excellent story looking at immigrants and their children, religion, Swedish society, Syrian terrorist camps, time travel, radicalization, internment, hate, religion, and more. A little confusing as it jumps between character, place, and time--more so because I read an e-galley with no indications other than content (and my total confusion) that the place/time/narrator had changed. I think this might have been a 5-star read for me if I had had those breaks and not had to read show more back repeatedly to find the change. Of course, maybe it's not easy to tell in the print version either. I don't know.
Even with my confusion, this book is fantastic. There are 3 stories being told, and they each converge with another, but how and when is not always clear until suddenly it is. I wish I had someone to discuss this with! I love dystopias, and I love literary fiction that takes on modern topics. This novel combines those two.
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A few years after a terrorist attack that goes strangely, with one of the terrorists killing another, a Swedish Muslim poet/author is contacted by that woman, who is in a psychiatric facility. She wants to meet him.
He knows about the attack, all Swedes do. The attack itself is based on the Charlie Hedbo attack in France. But one of the terrorists--a teenage girl--stopped it. He knows her story--she is actually a Belgian girl who had been to Syria, was rescued, and then fled to Sweden. But this is not who she says she is. This girl claims to be from the future (15-20 years in the future), and is herself unclear how or why she ended up in another body. But she had to stop the attack because it caused the restrictions and Muslim internment camps of the dystopian Sweden that she grew up in.
Does the narrator believe her or her official diagnosis of schizophrenia? What does he do? Does the reader believe her?
———
Thanks to Two Lines Press and Edelweiss Plus for providing me with an e-galley. show less
Even with my confusion, this book is fantastic. There are 3 stories being told, and they each converge with another, but how and when is not always clear until suddenly it is. I wish I had someone to discuss this with! I love dystopias, and I love literary fiction that takes on modern topics. This novel combines those two.
———
A few years after a terrorist attack that goes strangely, with one of the terrorists killing another, a Swedish Muslim poet/author is contacted by that woman, who is in a psychiatric facility. She wants to meet him.
He knows about the attack, all Swedes do. The attack itself is based on the Charlie Hedbo attack in France. But one of the terrorists--a teenage girl--stopped it. He knows her story--she is actually a Belgian girl who had been to Syria, was rescued, and then fled to Sweden. But this is not who she says she is. This girl claims to be from the future (15-20 years in the future), and is herself unclear how or why she ended up in another body. But she had to stop the attack because it caused the restrictions and Muslim internment camps of the dystopian Sweden that she grew up in.
Does the narrator believe her or her official diagnosis of schizophrenia? What does he do? Does the reader believe her?
———
Thanks to Two Lines Press and Edelweiss Plus for providing me with an e-galley. show less
A quietly tense story that focuses on Ruth who creates fictional people in order to change events for her company's clients. But Ruth also creates personal fictions for herself and her son, whose father was killed while she was a pregnant teenager. A thoughtful look at grief and immigration and poverty.
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Statistics
- Works
- 14
- Members
- 495
- Popularity
- #49,935
- Rating
- 3.9
- Reviews
- 20
- ISBNs
- 52
- Languages
- 9
- Favorited
- 1