So in March, I read this book The Other Woman, written by the Swedish author Therese Bohman. It was a great story that really grew on me as I read it. It is a story about a young woman trying to find her way in life and her place in her hometown Njörkjöping; a too small town to handle people who are divergent.
Therese Bohman
174 pages
Rating ★★★★
Synopsis from Goodreads:
From the author of Drowned, a passionate psychological drama where questions of power and sexuality are brought to a head.She works at Norrköping Hospital, at the very bottom of the hierarchy. Below the doctors, the nurses, and the nursing assistants. She works in the cafeteria. But she dreams of one day becoming an author, of moving away and living a completely different life.
Carl Malmberg, an older married man who works as a doctor at the hospital, stands out. Our protagonist enters into a passionate affair, though struggles with the knowledge that he may never be hers. At the same time, she finds her life further complicated as she wonders whether Dr. Malmberg’s sexual interest in her might be centered around the lopsided power dynamic between them, and whether a mysterious girl named Alex might be in love with her.
As the novel unfolds, a secret no one could have predicted has consequences on all involved.
Actually, when I picked this book up, I wasn’t that hooked. It is not a typical book for me to read but neither an untypical one.
I got this book as a gift from my mother. I always feel a bit touched when someone gives me a book as a gift. I don’t know exactly why, but it just feels rather personal. I wanted to read this book not only because my mother gave it to me, but also because it sounded more interesting after I read reviews about it. Some of the keywords for this book are identity, sexuality and gender politics, topics I found quite interesting. All the feedback I read on this book was also great and it really sounded like something, so I thought why not give it a chance?
But as I have already mentioned, I wasn’t that hooked at the beginning. I think the reason was the way the book was narrated. The story is told by a first-person narrator, a young woman, whose name we never learn. But the first person narrator was not a usual first-person narrator (like fx. in typical YA books) it was quite different from what I have read. The narrator just told her story in her own, but different way, which at the begging was hard to get into.
I believe I found two reasons why this way of narrating annoyed?/challenged me at the beginning. First, the story is told as one long stream of thoughts. Like one long stream, meaning the novel was neither divided into chapters or parts. For me, that was a bit repulsive (but only at the beginning). I prefer books divided into chapters.
Second, the narrator, the young woman, was a very unique and different woman and character. And she knew that. She saw things and looked upon the world differently than other people, at least differently from the people in Njörköping – the town where this book takes place.
But as the book developed this way of narrating, affected by the young woman’s unique personality and the non-existing chapters, was one of the things that made this book really special. I guess the things that I didn’t like in the begging turned into things that really made me love this book!
So the book evolves around the affair the young woman begins to have with Carl Malmberg, a doctor from the hospital where she works. ( I guess one could write a very long discussion essay whether or not it was a good/bad thing to have this affair and whose fault it was if it was someones. But I don’t feel like that. I do not believe it is the point or purpose of this book and this affair. So I am just gonna accept it as it is, they have an affair.) I never really liked Carl. I don’t know specifically why. Maybe he just gave me the creeps (even though I found them cute at some points) or maybe it was because I sometimes felt he didn’t give enough to the young woman. Or maybe it was because he wasn’t one the same “level” as her. Even though he was superior to her, due to their professions, he sometimes seemed beneath her. Maybe it was his intellect or his bad taste in underwear that seemed cheap, I don’t know.
Anyway, the affair doesn’t end with hearts and roses as you probably have guessed already. I won’t say anything but I still like the way it turned out, even if one might say it turned out bad.
One who is a reason why this affair goes wrong is the young woman’s new friend Alex. The two young women become friends over their mutual differences. I found Alex to be really cool! But in the end, she was also a little too much. Actually not a little, she was way too much! I don’t know whether to call her a bit crazy or scary.
As I got more into the book and the plot formed as the affair began, I started to get more and more excited about the book. I also started appreciating the intellectual reflect from the narrator more and more. And in the end, I found the young woman to be a quite special protagonist.
As I have already mentioned she was different. She did not necessarily see things the way other people did. But she accepted that other people saw things differently, though it bothered her when people judged her for not thinking believing the same. She was a complex character who challenged the norms of (a small town) society. She worked in a cantine at a hospital and had to face the prejudices that followed. She was not stupid. That is not why she was working at such a place. She was on the other hand quite intelligent. Through her stream of thoughts, she did several clever observations about women, society and feminism. She liked art and literature and wanted to be a writer herself. Even though I only have good/positive things to say about the protagonist it does not make her a perfect, only “good” person. She had flaws too. I mean she really did some stupid things sometimes. And at times she was quite naive… But she just seemed like a genuinely real person and I really liked that! She was a young woman trying to find her way and place in society.
This book was for me a really great and stimulating read. I will give it four very big stars!!
(The Other Woman is originally written in Swedish, I read it in Norwegian however, even though I am Danish… Don’t ask me why haha. The point is I have never underlined so much in a book before as in this one. There were so many beautiful and relevant points and reflections which I just had to save. I would love to share some of the quotes I have saved with you but as they are in Norwegian and I do not have the English version it is gonna be difficult. I’m sorry… )
Nicoline <3
Do you only read books in your native language or do you explore foreign authors as well? Have you read any books about feminism/gender politics that you could recommend to me?
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