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Islàndia, somnis de riolita
Lives crossed in a fantasy country. An unforgettable journey to Iceland. A watchmaker who has never left Sabadell and has to go to Iceland to fix and old clock. A young Scandinavian in search of a band to play the music he likes. A couple of geologists who go on their dream trip. A retired learned writer and a young journalist who had to interview him. A presumed victor. A novel that, like Route 1 that circles the Icelandic coast, connects the lives of characters who reflect on whether their lives are as they would wish and if there is still time to change them. With the stellar appearance of Halldór Laxness and Island of Formentera.
This short novel, published in June 2014, is the author’s first published novel. It is set in an unspecified contemporary period and recounts the stories of a group of people who all happen to be in the same café in central Reykjavik at the same time without meeting one another (…).
These intertwined stories are told within a tight structure, consisting of an initial chapter, set in the Reykjavik café, where the five main characters are all presented, followed by a series of five chapters each devoted to one of them - exposition and development of the narrative – and a second batch of five chapters with the resolution of each of their stories
The characters are clearly drawn and manage to be sufficiently different from one another to make following their individual stories straightforward and engaging (…) Iceland itself as a country plays an important role in the book and has a profound effect on the four visitors, acting as a catalyst to their evolution and helping them to realize their dreams.
The novel is in keeping with the contemporary fashion for intertwined stories (I’m thinking of books like Sebastian Faulks’ A Week in December or Amanda Craig’s Hearts and Minds) and is an essentially undemanding and pleasant read. It should be relatively straightforward to translate and the neutral setting of Iceland means there are no culture-specific items to explain.
From the reader´s report by Judith Willis