This is a story that makes women think: What is marriage? What is bigamy? Can a man really love two women? Must women always be rivals?
But it’s also a story that makes people think: Why do we judge on appearances? Why do our religious or moral convictions cause pain when imposed on others? Can we control what our children do? And if we can’t, are we responsible for their actions?
Perhaps what’s most frustrating about this novel is the thought that if these events had happened one hundred years later, the outcome would have been different. And we’d have lost a moving insight into human relationships.
This book is a great read, the first in a series of three. It's currently at the top of the bestseller list here in Spain. Living abroad and browsing through bookshops is sometimes an exercise in translation: you recognize the author's name but you often have to use your imagination or check out the original title to figure out whether you've already read the book in English. I don't know Swedish but it seems to me that the Spanish as well as Catalan title of this book - "The Men who Hated Women" - is closer to the original. Is the English title more politically correct?
BookBrowse seeks out and recommends the best in contemporary fiction and nonfiction—books that not only engage and entertain but also deepen our understanding of ourselves and the world around us.