A sharp, darkly playful novella about three listeners of an audiobook and the storyteller who refuses to stay in their lane. 

A streaming service has released a new audio book: The Blue Panther, a sweeping, dramatic retelling of an Icelandic woman’s extraordinary journey through war-ravaged Europe during the Second World War. But this novella isn’t about her. 

Instead, it follows three modern-day listeners as they try (and fail) to stay immersed in the audiobook’s gripping plot. Daily distractions, personal dramas, and emotional triggers interfere until the story itself begins to twist, turn, and intrude, directed by a narrator who refuses to respect the boundaries between fact and fiction. 

With sly humour, inventive structure, and a razor-sharp ear for how stories are consumed today, The Blue Panther, Audiobook is a novella that explores the nature of storytelling, the illusion of authorial control, and what it means to listen, really listen, in a world of constant noise. 

“Pálsdóttir writes with the hand of a mystery author and the mind of a postmodernist, teasing out her protagonist’s problem while playing with literary forms, fragmenting timelines, and injecting fierce irony.”
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY