The Swell

Kat Gordon

ICELANDIC mythology, a shipwreck on a storm-battered shore, and two generations of women fighting against a society with patriarchy ingrained its soul are the alluring ingredients of a stunning novel from exciting storyteller Kat Gordon.

The Swell, a moving, atmospheric and feisty feminist tale of life amidst the icy splendours, towering volcanoes and all-enveloping darkness of Iceland, was inspired by the author’s childhood immersion in the story of Beowulf, the Old English epic poem set in Scandinavia during the 6^th century, and from her own years of living in, and loving, this famously cold, dark and rugged island.

Weaving enticingly across two timelines separated by sixty-five years, and starring two courageous women living very different lives but facing the same challenges and desire for female empowerment, Gordon’s (pictured below) spellbinding tale of sisterhood, survival and resistance has a haunting, heartbreaking and page-turning mystery at its heart. It’s autumn of 1910 in a remote corner of Iceland where sisters Freyja and Gudrún live with their widower father, Papi, a taciturn fisherman of few words who is suspicious of all things new, sees bad omens everywhere, and regards his daughters as keepers of their house and tenant farm despite Gudrún’s longing to join his fishing trips.

But change is afoot one stormy night when the two sisters rescue a mysterious and charismatic young Dane called Tomas from a shipwreck near their home. Much the same age as Freyja and Gudrún, Tomas is strong, carefree and loves to sing.

Even though their father suspects he might be a Danish spy sent to undermine Iceland’s fight for independence, Tomas is allowed to stay on at their home to help with the haymaking and work for his lodgings.

Freyja, who says she was drawn out to the sea by a sense of impending disaster on the night of the shipwreck, feels a special tenderness towards the stranger who landed on their shore, but soon her older sister Gudrún begins to fear that another man – a man who is strictly out of bounds – is the one who has truly stolen Freyja’s heart. Sixty-five years later in Reykjavik, a young and ambitious 18-year-old girl called Sigga is spending time with her beloved grandmother, her Amma, who came to the city many years ago from a remote Icelandic peninsula. Sigga has always ‘half-lived’ at her Amma’s house where they bake together, chop wood and delight in thrilling stories from Icelandic folklore.

Sigga’s mother expects that her daughter will follow tradition and marry and have children but a new generation of young women like Sigga want to live, learn and see the world. Sigga will be heading to a prize-giving in London later in the year after winning a story-writing competition and before then, she is helping to organise  a ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ rally in Reykjavik involving over 15,000 women and calling for equal rights.

But when Sigga and her Amma learn a body has been discovered on a mountainside near Reykjavik, perfectly preserved in ice, the teenager is determined to discover why the news has so disturbed and distressed her grandmother…  

Written in a sweeping, sensual and almost cinematic prose which transports readers into the drama, dangers and majestic beauty of both the raw landscape of rural Iceland and the tamed modernity of downtown Reykjavik, Gordon imaginatively blends the country’s breathtaking and often brutal folklore with 20^th century women’s struggle against a culture of male domination and oppression.

The ties of family and female relationships loom large as the restrictions and frustrations faced by Freyja and Gúdrun are mirrored in the life of Sigga sixty-five years into the future where women are still fighting to do work seen as the sole province of men, to own their own property, and be recognised as equals in a male-dominated society.

For Freyja and Gúdrun, living in a place of wild isolation in early 20^th century Iceland, they must battle the demands of a patriarchal society as well as the perilous extremes of the Icelandic weather. And despite her city life in the later decades of the century, Sigga too faces a constant fight against society’s – and her own family’s – expectations and pressures. And as the suspense ramps up and the two timelines converge, the shocking truth is teased out, wrongs are righted, and a generational enigma is solved.

It’s a haunting, soul-searching, and yet ultimately hopeful, story in which the mingling of history, mystery, mythology and modernity reveals what appears to be an endless and timeless struggle for female equality. Ice-packed, breathtakingly imagined, and hauntingly beautiful, The Swell is the perfect match for those long winter nights…   
(Manilla Press, paperback, £9.99)