Elenia wrote:This means that we are ready for another book! I promised last time to give Soffía first pick, as Icelandic was the only language not available for the previous book club. So, Soffía, if you're have any book you'd like to suggest, please let us know.
First of all, congrats on finishing
Odinsbarn! An epic choice to be certain.
I've been pondering this question and my inclination is to pick something that is:
• Originally written in Icelandic
• Available in as many of the Nordic languages as possible
• Relatively short and relatively easy in its language, so that people at different levels can participate
• Sophisticated as a piece of literature, so that there's plenty to say about it
Therefore I'm going to suggest
Englar Alheimsins by Einar Már Guðmundsson, which is a modern classic of Icelandic literature, a winner of the Nordic Council Literature Prize. I know from a quick search that it's available in Norwegian, Danish and Faroese - I would be shocked if it isn't also in Swedish and Finnish, but maybe someone who speaks those languages can check? There's also an Icelandic audiobook (which I own).
I enjoyed the weekly reading sessions, and they generally worked quite well for me, but I know they don't work for everyone. I will now shamelessly steal Stelle's idea of picking a book, reading it, and then talking about it together at the end of a fixed period. That way everyone can read at their own pace, without worrying too much about falling behind or speeding ahead of the group. How does that sound?
I feel like there's something both encouraging and community-building about discussing a book as you go along. Is it maybe a question of reducing the weekly pace? I'm not certain how many pages you were aiming to get through per week.
Englar Alheimsins is about 220 pages in Icelandic and has 11 chapters, but the final one is very short. So I was thinking it would make sense to read it over 10 weeks, which would mean about 20 pages a week. There will still be plenty to discuss at that pace, though obviously the faster readers will be reading other things at the same time!