A diverse and dramatic novel, funny and sensitive, featuring highly vivid characters with sharply   defined personalities. A great novel in every sense.

A famous Icelandic writer, Einar J. Grimsson, dies at the age of 88, only to wake up in a novel he wrote some 40 years ago. At first, he is unaware of both his death, and the fact that he´s now living in a world of his own creation.

The old novel is set at a remote farm in the east part of Iceland and one day the old man is found lying out in the fields, like he just fell to earth. The farmer carries him into the house where the writer gradually comes to terms with his afterlife. Einar J. Grimsson is partly based on the Icelandic writer Halldor Laxness, who received the Nobel Prize in 1955, and the novel he’s trapped in is inspired by Laxness’s biggest novel, Independent People.

The Author of Iceland is an impressive story, fascinating and disturbing, about fact and fiction, death and creation.

• The Icelandic Literary Prize 2001
• The Bookseller’s Literary Award 2001

“A big literary event. An incredible book, a masterpiece.”
ICELANDIC NATIONAL TV

“Even people who have no interest in geysirs, sheep or Halldor Laxness can but praise and love this big European novel.”
DIE WELT

“The Author of Iceland is a powerful work of fiction, with the capacity to entrance and enrage its readers, just as its forerunners did early in the past century. The story is a gripping, realistic portrayal of human fate and tragedy, and at the same time a critical assessment of the century. It is indisputable proof that Hallgrímur Helgason is one of the most original and brilliant writers in Iceland today.”
DV NEWSPAPER

“A major achievement.”
MORGUNBLADID DAILY

“101 Reykjavik was a good one but this one is 101 times more fun.”
POLITIKEN

„The Author of Iceland is a scholarly, profound and fun novel.“
IL MANIFESTO