AshehougAgency

I Am the Walker Brothers

Jan Kjærstad returns with an exhuberant, humorous and deeply serious story of a boy who suddenly discovers the power of imagination and unconventional thinking.

Oslo, 1984: Odd Marius Walaker is 14 years old, and nothing is impossible anymore. He has an erotic relationship to the lady next door. He is attacked by four girls wanting to circumcise him. He sends teachers to see the headmaster. He has long conversations with Ancient Greece, his history teacher. He answer’s people’s love letters in a magazine. He speculates on the identity of the person terrorizing the city with book bombs. He has a strong wish to save his parents’ marriage, and he tries to assist when his best friend’s little brother is reported missing.

But beneath all this, Odd Marius is the Walker Brothers, wandering around town with a sharpened gaze and a book about life in the ocean in his backpack, drawing people’s hands and posing the same question to people he meets. Odd Marius sees possibilities perhaps no one else has seen before – but many years later, when he is called upon to lead his country through the worst crisis in history, the insights and powers of youth appear to be lost.

I Am the Walker Brothers deals with a young person’s body, but even more so with his imagination, his mental resources and the undreamed of powers he seems to possess. An unconventional coming-of-age tale seen through the observant eyes of a teenager, I Am the Walker Brothers is a vibrant, humorous, wonderfully written book that introduces a new, more playful and casual side to Kjærstad’s work.

Click here for sample translation and full presentation sheet (pdf).

Praise for I Am the Walker Brothers:

"Jan Kjærstad pays tribute to the power of thinking of teenagers, but shows no sign himself of losing his pyrotechnic power of imagination […] The more prominent humorous tone than Kjærstad has used before also suits the novel, which in addition is peopled with an extremely strong cast of characters, each carrying good stories."
(Dagsavisen)

"Kjærstad has delivered his best novel since [The Discoverer] in 1999 […] But its strength lies in the story of the Walker Brothers, who succeeds in keeping his double role as clumsy teenager and searching soul. He is allowed to be both larger than life and pathetically small, and he stumbles into humorous episodes and interesting people."
(NRK)

"The reader can’t help being seduced again, as Jan Kjærstad offers writing on the same level as the Jonas Wergeland trilogy […] ‘I am the Walker Brothers’ is an almost surprisingly humorous novel, with Kjærstad’s bold (but still logically consistent) leaps in style, time and place [Kjærstad’s message] is delivered in a light, playful, challenging and entertaining style.”
(Bergensavisen)

"Jan Kjærstad has created a literary cornucopia, where he plays with language, typography and the reader’s power associatioan in trademark fashion […] The dramatic climaxes, especially a dark portrayal of sexual abuse, are boxes containing other boxes of stories […] Both the people and the stories in this novel are beautifully intertwined with each other, realism is elegantly mixed with myth and mystique."
(VG)

"Perhaps Jan Kjærstad has become our greatest writer now […] the coming-of-age part of the novel is the best and most inspired part […] With ‘I Am the Walker Brothers’ lovers of Kjærstad has been given more to love. The doubt of the doubtful will be strengthened, if anybody hates ham they will have gotten plenty of fresh ammunition."
(Nationen)

"And even if a lot of positive things can be said about the author’s associative leaps, his contagious hunger for knowledge and generous use of erotic sweeteners, it’s time to strike a blow purely and simply for Kjærstad’s ability to describe people […] a memorable reading experience."
(Bergens Tidende)

"Explosive […] A good storyteller writes about man’s unimagined possibilities […] the characters and the portraits of Odd’s relationships with the people around him are in a class of their own."
(Dagbladet)

"A well crafted and consistent novel"
(Aftenposten)

"Sparkling, bristling, pricking, depressing. A brilliant work of art."
(Berlingske Tidende, Denmark)

"A wonderfully complex novel [...] Kjærstad's new novel is filled with small and great adventures."
(Svenska Dagbladet, Sweden)

”I know no other writer with Kjærstad’s ability to keep 20-30 lead motives going in one and the same novel and seemingly unintentionally let them cross each other’s track throughout the story, as if it happens by random association, rather than careful planning ... All the characters in I AM THE WALKER BROTHERS have their specific place in the story’s clockwork, but that doesn’t mena they about mechanically, like the figures in a clock tower. That is the great strength of Kjærstad’s works – the clockwork keeps ticking, but the time being shown is biologic and historic, the time which pulsates in the blood and fills our consciousness with the presence of mind and images of memory,”
(Expressen, Sweden)

First published: 2008, Aschehoug
Jan Kjærstad: Biography and bibliography

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