Beckomberga

Stridsberg’s singular novel (after The Antarctica of Love) traces the history of Stockholm’s Beckomberga psychiatric asylum via wrenching stories of its patients. The story begins in 1995 with the hospital about to close; the last remaining patient, 63-year-old Olof, was admitted as a teen and is now allowed to roam freely about the grounds. Feeling hopeless, he throws himself from the roof and dies. Jackie, the narrator, then relates how her father Jim, an alcoholic and prescription pill abuser, was admitted to Beckomberga decades earlier after his attempted suicide. There, he befriended Olof and fell in love with reckless fellow patient Sabina. Jackie began visiting Jim at Beckomberga as a teen; sometimes, he refused to see her, and she began spending time with the hospital’s other occupants, even embarking on an affair with one. After she gets pregnant by another man, she decides to raise the child alone (“I left Rickard when I was pregnant; I knew that I would never be able to share a child with anyone”). Meanwhile, Jim’s wife travels the world photographing disasters, leaving him and Jackie to pick up the pieces upon his release. Stridsberg’s lyrical and unflinching narrative coheres into a relentless and strangely beautiful portrait of a family’s gloom (as Jim tells Jackie, “Life is a work of grief”). It’s astonishing. Agent: Laurence Laluyaux, RCW Literary. (Jan.)