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Biographical note
Halldór Laxness (1908-98) was born near Reykjavik, Iceland. His first novel was published when he was seventeen. The undisputed master of contemporary Icelandic fiction and one of the outstanding novelists of the twentieth-century, he wrote more than sixty books. Laxness was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1955.<i>The Atom Station</i> is the work of someone who has seen every cherished dream sold down the river, but who loves humanity too much to despair. His heroine refuses to be bullied or bought, a feminist before her time, full of curiosity and spirit
Guardian
Laxness is a poet who writes to the edges of the pages, a visionary who allows us a plot.
Daily Telegraph
An extraordinary book, brimming with little wisdoms, funny episodes, sharp phrases...and a determined optimism of spirit
The Times
Laxness was a genius
New York Review of Books
Magnus Magnusson's translation reads smoothly and skilfully renders Laxness's dry and quirky wit
Times Literary Supplement
Above all else the writing of Laxness is beautiful. His countryman's eye finds wonder everywhere in the landscape
Sunday Tribune
When the Americans make an offer to buy land in Iceland to build a NATO airbase after the Second World War, a storm of protest is provoked throughout the country. Narrated by a country girl from the north, the novel follows her experiences after she takes up employment as a maid in the house of her Member of Parliament. Her observations and experiences expose the bourgeois society of the south as rootless and shallow and in stark contrast to the age-old culture of the solid and less fanciful north.
'The Atom Station is the work of someone who has seen every cherished dream sold down the river, but who loves humanity too much to despair. His heroine refuses to be bullied or bought, a feminist before her time, full of curiosity and spirit' Guardian