The international star Sara Stridsberg returns with The Antarctica of
Love, an unnamed woman's tale of her murder, her brief life, and the
world that moves on after she left it
They say you die three times. The first time for me was when my heart
stopped beating beneath his hands by the lake, and the second was when
what was left of me was lowered into the ground in front of Ivan and
Raksha at Bromma Church. The third time will be the last time my name is
spoken on earth.
She was a neglected child, an unreliable mother, a sex worker, a drug
user--and then, like so many, a nameless victim of a violent crime. But
first she was a human being, a full, complicated person, and she insists
that we know her fully as she tells her story from beyond the grave. We
witness her short life, the harrowing murder that ended it, and her
grief over the loved ones she has left behind. We see her parents
struggle with guilt and loss. We watch her children grow up in adopted
families and patch together imperfect lives. We feel her dreams, fears,
and passions. And still we will never know her name.
A heartrending novel of life after death, Sara Stridsberg's The
Antarctica of Love is an unflinching testament of a woman on the
margins, a tale of family lost and found, a report of a murder in the
voice of the victim, and a story that brims with unexpected tenderness
and hope.
