Ia Genberg's The Details

 

The Details / Ia Genberg
trans. from the Swedish by Kira Josefsson
NY: Harper Via, 2023, c2022.
137 p.

I was able to read this via my local library, as it was an International Booker shortlisted title -- award nominees and winners are always likelier to show up in libraries! I'm really glad this one did, though, as I liked it a lot. 

This is a short and quiet novel: our narrator begins it when she is sick and looks into some of her books -- there is an inscription from a former girlfriend. This starts a chain of memory, from Johanna (the girlfriend) to Niki, Alejandro and finally Birgitte. The recollections tell us about these people, but perhaps they tell us even more about our narrator. What is revealed when talking about relationships? This is the question. I copied out a quote from this book that seems to sum it up: 

‘That's all there is to the self, or the so-called 'self': traces of the people we rub up against’ 

Nothing much really happens plotwise - all the action is in the past. And yet this series of recollections has power to move us. The book is loosely organized into four sections, looking at one relationship at a time, and all through these sections, she uses books as markers of memory, as ways to recall moments in the relationships. Opening a book reminds her of when and with who it was read, and the circumstances around the same time. I find this is a palpable effect in my own bookshelves, and I was impressed with the ways that Genberg creates such a reflective book that incorporates so many elements into such compressed prose. 

Johanna was her first serious lover, whose leaving was a shock -- Niki a strange girl with mercurial moods, who disappeared and doesn't leave traces -- Alejandro a short lived relationship that affected her deeply nonetheless -- and then right back to the core with Birgitte, her mother. I found them all fascinating but the final section with her parents was a strong finish. In just brief sketches she draws them both so clearly. Her mother was anxious and flitted around the edges of their home life, while her father was a social man, a talker -- she notes that he would talk with a group of men for ages, and I enjoyed one of his comments a lot: 

His favorite position was opposing the popular argument that communism was a good idea in theory and for this reason had real value ("This bridge looks good but unfortunately it collapses as soon as someone tries to drive across.").

But this section is quite serious, as we discover the trauma that damaged her mother and shaped her childhood. It's the details that really count. 

I loved this read. It captures character sketches so well, illuminates the protagonist while doing so, and the writing and the literary references were just what I like in a book. As I saw someone describe this on Goodreads, it's the perfect "no plot just vibes" read. If that's also your thing, you'll enjoy this too.