Collected Works: A Novel: 'A wry bestseller that reads like the effortlessly chic European cousin of Fleishman is in Trouble' (Telegraph)

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Collected Works . . . is as insatiable in its read as it is insightful to modern challenges of family, memory, and finding purpose.”—Matthew Bedard, Flaunt Rakel, too, in particular, is given a significant role, and along with Gustav there's quite good breadth to the novel. A book begging to be read on the beach, with the sun warming the sand and salt in the air: pure escapism.

Kastellgatan was actually located at the heart of Martin’s walking pattern. He passed Järntorget Square every day. He often walked up Linnégatan or down Övre Husar. Sometimes, he had to get from one of those streets to the other, via Risåsgatan or Majorsgatan, for instance, but no matter what route he chose, he never ended up on Kastellgatan. It had been that way for over a decade, with one glaring exception, that time he accidentally found himself in Cecilia’s old flat.

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The comparatively short novel is in fact the newcomer and literary interloper. By the late 19th century, novels were becoming more accessible and word counts were shrinking to the point where one literary critic in 1898 predicted mournfully “we shall end by reducing our romance to a geometrical diagram”. Collected Works: An amazing novel for a long weekend read – about love, loneliness and literature. (…) The author (…) has created an expansive polyphonous tale celebrating magnificent authors. Sartre, Camus, Selene, Rimbaud, Baudelaire, Joyce – masters from different eras are not only mentioned in the novel, their works reference events and ideas that are paramount to the characters in it. (…) The result of a decade’s work, the novel by Lydia Sandgren, is intended to be read mindfully, a read under which it is well worth putting everything else aside, turn off the wi-fi and immerse yourself in the story. The reader will be rewarded with an enthralling mystery and a fantastic story about love, literature, and longing – as an integrated force steering decisions and actions.” The present-day finds Martin's two children increasingly independent but still struggling to find their way, Gustav seemingly more or less unchanged, despite the great success he's had, and Martin wondering where it all went -- the years, his writerly ambitions, and, yes, his wife. It's a promising premise for a novel, a mystery that Sandgren builds her novel around from two sides: events leading up to it (albeit focused more on Martin than Cecilia) and then the situation fifteen years later.

While Cecilia, is very much absent in the present-day, the scenes from years earlier chronicling her relationship with Martin do flesh her out well. Compelling, tense and moving – I loved this smart and subtle exploration of modern motherhood and womanhood.” Nothing in Collected Works feels superfluous, despite its length. The secret at the heart of the book is what might keep someone reading, but it is all the various characters and their shaded intentions, so elegantly described, that makes this book a pleasure to read. It is truly rich, describing Martin’s life in particular in real depth. However, Sandgren shows that we can seemingly know all the facts of someone’s life and miss what they hide – from others and from themselves – even when it is in plain sight. It’s an addictive read, which reveals, teases, and conceals superbly, and which, like all the best big books, leaves the finishing reader bereft. Martin Berg is a Swedish publisher living in the aftermath of tragedy. More than a decade ago, his wife, a writer and academic named Cecilia, vanished one morning, leaving behind Martin and their two young children, Rakel and Elis. In her outstanding debut novel, Collected Works, translated into propulsive English by Agnes Broomé, Lydia Sandgren tells Martin’s story across two narrative timelines. The novel interweaves his youth and the progress of his life up to Cecilia’s disappearance with events in the present day, where Rakel, his daughter, is preparing a reader’s report on a German novel to which Martin has been offered the rights. It seems, astonishingly, to be about her missing mother. lachje’) betekenisvol beschrijven. Dat gaat nooit ten koste van de vaart waarmee ze ons in haar uitgekiende labyrint meetroont. In een groots opgezet schouwspel etaleert ze met verve een brede waaier aan thema’s. Ze doorspekt het verhaal met feiten en bespiegelingen over de jaren 70, verschillende muziekscenes, Ludwig Wittgenstein, de toenemende commercialisering van kunst en de interne keuken van de boekenwereld. Uitgever Martin Berg vreest het witte blad, een ironisch contrast met Sandgren zelf, die haar inkt als een vloedgolf over de pagina’s laat stromen. Extreem waarachtig schetst de jonge Zweedse de drie-eenheid Martin, Gustav, Cecilia, en uiterst bekwaam vervlecht ze hun levenspaden met tonnen cultuurhistorische referenties tot een smakelijke hoop verwennerij.Collected Works long feels like it must be working up to a clarifying reveal -- presumably involving some resolution with or regarding Cecilia. A witty, toothy, family saga, unashamedly intellectual . . . that, like youth, seems to have it all—energy, aspiration, and self-delusion.”— Catherine Taylor, Financial Times So who was Cecilia? Martin's eccentric wife, Gustav's enigmatic muse, an absent mother - a woman who was perhaps only true to herself. When Martin's daughter Rakel stumbles across a clue about what happened to her mother, she becomes determined to fill in the gaps in her family's story. But she can't escape the simple question at the heart of it How can anyone leave someone they love? Offering a reader upward of a quarter of a million words is a big ask, not least in this attention-sapping, time-scarce epoch with countless distractions tugging constantly at our sleeves. A writer must be sure of themselves and sure-footed enough in their writing to pull off a book of this kind of length. She translated Wittgenstein's diaries, and published two books of her own before she disappeared (more than Martin ...).

With this debut, Lydia Sandgren steps forward as a new writer of great importance. Collected Works enriches Swedish writing with extraordinary fiction.”

Is Collected Works’ immense length justified? Yes. Could it have been shorter? Also, yes. Will Collected Works help to restore the literary tradition of the long novel? Very possibly. A witty, toothy, family saga, unashamedly intellectual . . . that, like youth, seems to have it all—energy, aspiration, and self-delusion." — Catherine Taylor, Financial Times

Hij, Gustav en Cecilia zijn dan een drie-eenheid. Als geliefde van Martin, fungeert Cecilia ook als muze en model voor de boezemvriend, een kunstenaar in hart en nieren. Zij wordt Gustavs grote inspiratiebron voor de schilderijen uit zijn meest succesvolle periode. Samen vertrekken Martin en Gustav in hun studentenjaren naar Parijs waar Cecilia hen later vervoegt, om inspiratie op te doen voor hun culturele interesses. Martin jaagt dan nog steeds de droom na om een onnavolgbaar schrijver te worden terwijl Gustav al goed op weg is in het ontdekken van zijn kunst en kunnen. Martin heeft dan ook op dat moment een te romantisch beeld van een schrijversbestaan voor ogen. So who was Cecilia? Martin’s eccentric wife, Gustav’s enigmatic muse, an absent mother – a woman who was perhaps only true to herself. When Martin’s daughter Rakel stumbles across a clue about what happened to her mother, she becomes determined to fill in the gaps in her family’s story. But she can’t escape the simple question at the heart of it all: How can anyone leave someone they love?Novels are often described as being “crafted” and it’s usually just as a handy synonym for “written”, but Collected Works has been put together with the care of a medieval scribe and the patient skill of a master carver.