I fell in love with Vigdis Hjorth while reading Will and Testament, which I read literally with baited breath - I had never read a novel full of such tense anxiety and injustice regarding family relationships, that I nearly felt ill. And this my glowing review of that novel! I want to read it again at some point, when I'm emotionally more prepared...

Is Mother Dead feels like a sequel. In it, an estranged, adult daughter tries to establish a relationship with her mother after what seems like an honest misunderstanding has soured their relationship for decades. Another novel of Hjorth's where I had to keep reminding myself to breathe while reading.

What I found especially cool about this novel was the narration: it seemed to be simultaneously two stories, where the daughter's story is told in first-person narrative, and the mother's story from a third-person narrative viewpoint - the daughter's! So often the daughter stalks the mother, imagining what is going on through her mother's head, what were the decisions she made that led to the life they ended up living. It's up to the reader to figure out how much of it is wish-fulfillment and how much reality, underlining the message of how we're able to live in such different worlds and understandings of what is going on, despite seemingly experiencing exactly the same events.

Like with Will and Testament, I put this book down with a hollow feeling of "Jesus Christ..." Not an easy read, but a great read nevertheless.