Review 496: Woman at 1,000 Degrees

Woman at 1,000 Degrees by Hallgrímur Helgason
My rating: 3.5 of 5 stars


This novel is loosely based around the grand-daughter of the first President of Iceland and the family. There are accurate facts in the book, but it is largely fictional. Apparently the Björnsson family did not like how they are portrayed in this book. After reading it, I can understand why. No one is dealt with in a good light.

The frame of the book is told by a dying elderly woman, Herra Björnsson, telling her life story. She is welcoming this death, calling a crematorium to schedule her own appointment to be cremated. This is where the title comes from, as she is told the ovens are set at 1,000 degrees.

The narrative is not linear, it jumps around time, from the present to the past at many moments, with very short chapters, just a page or two, sometimes a few more. I found it hard to get into the book, contemplated not finishing it for some time, but I’m a sucker for completing books I start (usually) and went forth.

This is satire, dry wit and humor, and sometimes I got the joke, but this is all to cover up the horrors of war and the atrocities that get committed.

Herra’s father and mother had a rocky beginning, being from different social classes and when mom got pregnant with Herra, her young dad assumed they would not welcome her into the family. So the first seven years of Herra’s life she knew nothing about her father. Once they were reunited the Björnsson’s welcomed the wife and child with open arms. Soon they left Iceland for Denmark where Herra was brutalized with bullying and took to not going to school and learning instead from a couple of women, a prostitute and another who also taught Herra about love and men.

World War II was brewing and Herra’s dad decided to join the German army. (This is fact, the son of the first President of Iceland joined the Nazi party and fought alongside Germany.) Herra’s life goes downhill from here, separated first from her father, later from her mother. For a time she was on an island being kept safe from the war. Unfortunately, she doesn’t stay there and her Dad leave’s her in a train station with only a hand grenade to keep her safe, told to wait for her mother to arrive. She doesn’t. Herra now a young teenager is left to wander through Germany and Poland and experiences war in a way that no teenager should. The hand grenade becomes almost a character throughout the story.

After the Herra and her Dad live in Argentina, again separated from her mom.

In the current time of 2009 as Herra awaits her death, her sons barely visit, she stalks them, along with their wives and children as she has a laptop to connect to the world. We aren’t given too much about these sons, and family, but we do know she still mourns her first born, a girl who died.
There are some funny passages, and the horrors of war are kept at a distance by the short chapters and switching between timelines. I do tend to avoid books about wars, but this one snuck in.