I have trouble sleeping. Or rather, trouble waking. The busier I am the more difficult it is to feel rested. I’m greyed out most of the day walking through in an aching haze. Hildur Knútsdóttir’s newly translated book The Night Guest presents a particularly horrifying and relatable scenario for me.
Iðunn is similarly afflicted, upon waking in the morning, the young Reykjavíkite finds herself unrested, and sore. She begins finding strange bruises, stains, and injuries on her body. She can’t trust doctors, especially the dismissive paternalistic men, but she books an appointment with a young woman in residency, who takes Iðunn’s concerns very seriously and assuages her fears but cannot diagnose her. Friends suggest exercise, so Iðunn buys a fitness watch with a pedometer in it and resolves to be more active. The increased exercise doesn’t help, and one morning Iðunn wakes up to find her pedometer tracked 40,000 steps while she slept.
The Night Guest makes its way to North America this September. Translated by Mary Robinette Kowal, Knútsdóttir’s book is deliciously lean. It’s the kind of anxious one-sitting read that grabs your attention right away and holds you captive until you’ve finished it. I won’t be revealing much more than the dust jacket already does because I don’t want to spoil the experience for you. The Night Guest speaks to something that feels universal about growing up. Living in your 20s, away from home, and finished with college, professional life begins taking a toll on you emotionally, physically, and in terms of your identity. As you’re thrust into the world with all these expectations on you, there’s little time to figure out who you are. The resulting fallout can feel like being at constant war with yourself. Iðunn finds herself in a situation where that predicament is actualized. As this problem with somnambulism begins to spiral out of control, Iðunn is unable to keep up with her friends, family, and job. She begins losing herself; both in the physical damage to her person, and in the relationships that are destroyed. Even her dearest hobby, befriending the neighborhood cats, is taken from her as the felines all seem to have developed a strange fear of Iðunn.
Expectations come from a variety of sources, bosses, her job, friends, and her parents, especially her mother. Having lost a sibling, Iðunn has taken it upon herself to make up for everything her sister lost. Patriarchal expectations about women’s bodies, roles, and appearances are thematically centered in this novel, especially the way women impose sad standards on fellow women. “The patriarchy speaks with my mother’s voice.”
Pacing is a delicate thing in a book, overdo the short chapters and it can begin to feel like a gimmick. The Night Guest hits the perfect momentum, as Iðunn’s panic increases, the chapters whittle down to rapid-fire slivers, often a single sentence back-to-back-to-back. This narrative decompression increases with the tension, forcing the reader to flip pages in the ensuing panic. This in conjunction with the first-person present tense narration style forces the reader to inhabit Iðunn with an intimacy that is both alienating and disturbingly relatable.
Lastly, I’ll just add plainly; this book creeped me the hell out. I strongly recommend picking this up when it hits shelves on September 3rd. Perhaps it’s merciful that The Night Guest will keep you up at night because by the time Iðunn’s journey concludes, you won’t want to sleep anyway.
I received an advance reading copy free as an attendee of StokerCon '24 and am leaving this review voluntarily. Below are links to purchase The Night Guest from two local (St. Louis) bookstores which Nocturne Books and Media is not affiliated with but firmly believes deserve your support.
Sounds really interesting, will definetly check this one out in September!