Helga Flatland: Divorce the Norwegian Way
– Norway
Born in 1984, she debuted in 2010 with her novel Bli hvis du kan. Reis hvis du må (If You Can, Stay. If You Have to, Go), which tells the story of four young men from a remote Norwegian village, who enlist in a Norwegian army mission in Afghanistan, where three of them die there. She quickly became one of the most widely read Norwegian authors, when her fifth novel A Modern Family, sold over one hundred thousand copies in Europe. In this novel, she depicts a story of three adult siblings who gather to celebrate their fahter's seventieth birthday, only to be informed by their parents that they are getting a divorce. The bittersweet novel offers the readers a detailed perspective on family relationships full of regret, sadness, but also hope that it is never too late for a change. Czech readers can currently read only the author's debut novel, the novel A Modern Family was published in Slovak in 2020. Her second novel, Alle vil hjem. Ingen vil tilbake (Everybody Wants to Go Home. Nobody Wants to Return), will be published in Czech in 2024.