Depths by Henning Mankell
“Powerful fiction. . . . Only Mankell can summon with such a dream-like intensity the Nordic landscapes and climates he knows so well.” -The Guardian
I finished reading the book. This is one of the books I've been reading for years. I boughtand and started reading it two, or even three years ago. At last, I settled myself to finish it, and I did. The book is quite true to its name in many ways. Not least because of the way it is written I felt I was drowining in slow and deep waves. The prose is very sparse. The chapters are often one page long - and most often two pages long (there are 403 pages split up into 206 chapters). At first the atmosphere in the book is palpably heavy, extremely regulated and punctual, however later it becomes more oppressing and frenetic as the protagonist's fall (or drowning) into the depths of his own soul intensify.
Depending on your mood you might find the book too long, and too full of symbolic phrases, however I tend to like these things. I would call the book slow-paced and very meditative. Throughout the book there is a poetic-like feeling to the text. The protagonist, if he may be called so, is a very unusual one. He is by far not a nice person, but sertainly a memorable one. As the pace of events quickens the reader watches protagonist's desperate and unstoppable decline with an increasing fascination combined with a growing disgust.
This is not a book for many, however it is a worthy book to read. An exploration and to a certain degree measurement not only of the protagonist's depths, but a cause to measure our own..
Official synopsis of the book is under the cut.
It is October 1914, and Swedish naval officer Lars Tobiasson-Svartman is charged with a secret mission to take depth readings around the Stockholm archipelago. In the course of his work, he lands on the rocky isle of Halsskär. It seems impossible for it to be habitable, yet it is home to the young widow Sara Fredrika, who lives in near-total isolation and is unaware that the world is at war.
A man of control and precision, Tobiasson-Svartman is overwhelmed by his attraction to the half-wild, illiterate Sara Fredrika, a total contrast to his reserved, elegant wife. Soon he enacts the worst of his impulses, turning into another, far more dangerous man, ready to trade in lies and even death to get closer to the lonely woman without losing hold of his wife. Matters of shame, fidelity, and duty are swept to sea as he struggles to maintain his parallel lives, with devastating consequences for the women who love him.