Khemiri (Montecore) won Sweden's most prestigious literary honor, the August Prize, for this compelling novel about Samuel, who was born in Sweden but is of North African descent, and whose last day alive is reconstructed by an unnamed narrator who wants to write about the young man for his own introspective purposes. Was Samuel's death in a car crash an accident, suicide, or murder? Through tantalizing fragments, the reader learns of the dead man's various relationships: with Laide, the woman he was dating, who wanted to provide a safe house for abused Muslim women; with Vandad, Samuel's roommate, with whom he had a falling out; and with Samuel's grandmother, who allowed Laide's abused women to live in her house, until somebody burned it down. In this painful novel about youthful optimism gone hopelessly wrong, Khemiri dramatizes such immigration-related issues as failures in elder care, unemployment and dead-end jobs, drug abuse, and racial prejudice. Agent: Astri von Arbin Ahlander, Ahlander Agency (Sweden). (July) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

In Stockholm, a young man's death forces his friends to consider their culpability. At the outset of Swedish novelist and playwright Khemiri's novel, the protagonist is already dead. The mission of the novel is to piece together the how and why. Samuel, the main character, is killed in a single-car collision with a tree, whether due to bad brakes or suicidal intent is unclear. Flashbacks and flash-forwards follow, narrated in short segments by, among others, Samuel; his friend and housemate, Vandad; and his ex-lover Laide. Samuel and Laide met through their work; he is a functionary with the Migration Board, dealing with residency permits, and she is an interpreter of Arabic and other languages. Laide is also an activist who participates in demonstrations against anti-immigration policies and who establishes, in a house vacated by Samuel's grandmother, a shelter for women, many of them abused, who have fled the Middle East. Vandad, who, it appears, may be gay and attracted to Samuel, is a large man who works as an enforcer for a loan shark until his conscience gets the better of him. He tries more legitimate employment as a mover without much success. Samuel's grandmother, who suffers from dementia, has moved into a nursing home. At first Laide and Samuel's affair blossoms, but it sours in less than a year. When Laide breaks it off, Vandad, out of misguided loyalty to Samuel, reverts to thuggish form in trying to persuade her to reconsider. The grandmother's house is soon overrun with refugees, a fire starts, and Samuel's despair mounts as his family questions why he allowed this to happen, and he himself wonders why he trusted Laide. The piecemeal structure, an agglomeration of vignettes, makes it hard to identify who is narrating. Although the postmodern presentation is initially off-putting, the characters, once we discern who's talking, are deftly drawn. Their voices, resonating with internal conflict and arch humor, are ably rendered in Willson-Broyles' translation. Initially confusing but ultimately moving and grimly funny. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

In this fast-paced, uniquely structured novel, the winner of Sweden's prestigious August Prize, Tunisian-Swedish Khemiri (Montecore, 2011) explores family, race, inheritance, and memory. Through several unnamed narrators, readers learn that there has been a death, and before that, an accident and a fire, and soon Khemiri's novel drives itself. Through the group, we're introduced to Samuel, a kindhearted, enigmatic young man, and taken through the year or two preceding his untimely death. Before long, we recognize that the narrators must be talking to a writer or recorder: someone trying to compile a story that might not be wholly knowable. In a roundabout way, Samuel's closest connections become deeply drawn characters during their confessional moments. In this broken narrative, versions of Samuel's life and death intersect and diverge, clarify and complicate. Was Samuel a devoted lover or patent loser? Charming eccentric or unhinged obsessive? Hero or coward? Too much discussion of the book's plot threatens to betray its delicate architecture, but readers needn't be too patient to be utterly enveloped by it.--Bostrom, Annie Copyright 2016 Booklist

In Khemiri's (Swedish) August Prize-winning work, an unnamed novelist tries to piece together the life of a young man named Samuel, dead from a violent crash, an accident/suicide. It's been said that a second-person-voice novel is impossible, but this effectively is one. Characters speak directly to the novelist, sometimes addressing him as "you"; the most frequent voices are a girlfriend, Laide, and a best friend/roommate Vandad, both estranged from Samuel, who paint different pictures. It's clear that Samuel is trying to figure himself out, and to some extent the others try to define themselves through him. Whether Samuel's attempts to make deposits in his "experience bank" are sufficiently interesting to keep people reading is debatable. Was his death a suicide, or just another piece of experience? Several episodic subplots emerge (a safe house for immigrant women, a demented grandmother). In the end Samuel gets to relate his last few hours, and the novelist finally gets a voice, briefly, showing that his interest in Samuel's death is more than just fodder for a forthcoming book. VERDICT A "must" for those interested in narrative voice; otherwise, this is beautifully rendered but slow-paced psychological fiction. [See Prepub Alert, 1/25/16.]-Robert E. Brown, Oswego, NY © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.