A strange, dreamlike where reality is hard to place. Elizabet Eva is a spy who stumbles on a group of creatures that are both women and swans. She is entranced by them, uncertain of their reality or their meaning, feelings which are shared by the reader. Omarsdottir creates an ebbing, flowing narrative that questions the nature of reality and its malleability through fable and deception. It's an abstract story where both questions and answers are difficult to discern but the writing is surprising and beautiful.

In dystopian future a government spy discovers that there are swan people living in the fringes of the town. I honestly don't know how to review this novel; the story is like nothing I've ever read before and was more than a little strange but I was oddly drawn to it and had to finish the novel to see what happens,


Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of the novel in exchange for an honest review.

This magical, eccentric novel features a mysterious protagonist who finds swan-humans near her home! (Yes, that is the real synopsis :)

I really really enjoyed the concept behind the novel and I think themes like domestication, power struggles and even more subtle ideas about global warming / human rights came through very well. The slightly detached writing style worked very well for the style of the novel and I LOVED the monologues with her colleagues.

My only complaint is probably the strange chronology, but I think that comes down to personal taste. A nice vibe for those who like dystopian / magical realism heavy books and certainly not like anything you’ve read before. Good translation too!

Overall I found this short translated novella enthralling, mystical, and bitterly sweet with a stubborn tinge of icy shock weaved delicately but firmly throughout.
It wasn’t at all what I expected-and this is both in favour and out of it, too.
For the in favour I found myself more invested than I thought I would be, deeply connected to the main character as we took this breathless, strange journey alongside her, I also found that the descriptions were wonderful, extremely vivid and bright and alive.
However, and I’ve seen several reviewers say the same, I don’t think the overall translation of this particular work was done extremely well because although I appreciate the choice of a disjointed, dizzy narrative that worked well with the weirdness and pace of the short book I felt that a lot of it felt too stiff and stale and it just didn’t draw me in just enough as it could’ve. I was hoping to give this one four stars because the idea itself was beautiful enough, but if the writing had just not been as stiff it could’ve been such a poetic, poignant piece.
I understand this was a fairytale and of course the weird, untraceable narrative worked quite well to set this unique, bizarre world, but the writing itself just didn’t gel enough for me to become entirely invested in the story.

This is a beguilingly strange narrative with a dream-like feel, the prose lit with bright colours throughout ('I came from a country that did not exist and lived from birth in its capital, by a blue bay and a violet mountain whose slopes were scaled by a verdurous green in summer and in winter were veiled by snow'), and where the uncannily strange and the everyday become inextricably intertwined.

Did I always know how to make rational sense of this book? No - but I was wooed by its strangeness and the play of images that activated all kinds of sub-rational ideas in my head. With themes (I think) of gender, trauma, power, resistance, retreat and recuperation, this works fascinatingly at a kind of archetypal level. Not one for readers who want 'reality' and a logical narrative of progression and clarity, this works more like liberatory poetry that frees the imagination.

Not really sure what to make of "Swanfolk" by Kristin Omarsdottir. It's all very odd. I've read some odd but amusing books in my time when I've been able to peer past some of the strange antics and have an inkling into the author's brain. Unfortunately not here. Maybe if someone could explain it to me, I may find more enjoyment within.

There's probably some deeper meaning to this book that went right over my head. This happens.
However, I enjoyed it for what it was.... strange.
It's quite a short book, and that helped to just go with the flow and not try to work out what it COULD mean.
It's a bit fairy tale like, and other wordly.
Interesting, but not one I'll ever be able to explain