Perseus Academic: To Mervas by Elisabeth Rynell

Elisabeth Rynell's language can only be described as breathtakingly beautiful.

Upsala New Daily

Shortlisted for Sweden's August Prize, Elisabeth Rynell's To Mervas is a vivid exploration of both an external and internal wilderness. Marta, a middle-aged woman who has withdrawn almost completely into herself, is jolted back into contact with the world by a letter from her once-great love. Physical and emotional abuse, longing and loss, and the nature of love and redemption are explored with remarkable empathy and a visceral lyricism in Rynell's wrenching novel.

Elisabeth Rynell, born in Stockholm, is a poet and a novelist. Her works include the poetry volumes Night Conversations, Sorrow Winged Songs, Desert Wanderer, and the novels A Tale of Loka and Hohaj. To Mervas was a finalist for the August Strindberg prize and is her first novel to appear in English.

Elisabeth Rynell is a novelist and poet. Her poetry was anthologized in the 1996 collection Forest of Childhood: Poems from Sweden. Her first novel, Hohaj, was adapted into the Swedish film Snowland in 2004. To Mervas is her first novel to appear in English.

Victoria Häggblom is a writer and translator. She has received several grants and awards from the PEN American center, The Swedish Institute, the American-Scandinavian Foundation, The Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry, and the Santa Fe Arts Institute, the Koret Foundation, and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown.