Nordic Visions: The Best of Nordic Speculative Fiction
About this ebook
Storytelling has been a major force in the Nordic countries for thousands of years, renowned for its particular sense of dark humour, featuring pacts with nature and a view of the world you seldom find in other places.
Perhaps it is the freezing cold winter? The closeness to the Atlantic Ocean and the Arctic? Maybe it’s the huge ancient forests...
Most have heard about Nordic crime fiction with its dark noir flare or the Icelandic Sagas. This anthology combines all that is unique about Nordic speculative fiction, from the darkest dystopian science fiction to terrifying horror. From the rational to the eccentric, these stories combine a deep sense of place with social criticism, themes of loneliness and the concern for humanity's impact on the wilderness.
Featuring 16 stories from the best contemporary speculative authors from Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, and The Faroe Islands, including John Ajvide Lindqvist, Hannu Rajaniemi, Tor Åge Bringsværd and more, many of which are appearing in English for the very first time.
About the author
Margrét Helgadóttir is a Norwegian-Icelandic author and anthologist living in Oslo, Norway. Her short fiction appears in many venues, such as Slate, Luna Station Quarterly, Girl at the End of the World, and Sunspot Jungle, to name a few. Her debut book—The Stars Seem So Far Away—was a finalist at the British Fantasy Awards 2016, and is an apocalyptic road tale set in a far-future Arctic world. Margrét is the editor of the anthology Winter Tales (2016) and the anthology series Fox Spirit Books of Monsters, seven volumes published between 2014 and 2020. Three volumes were shortlisted for the British Fantasy Awards as Best Anthology (2016, 2017 and 2018), and Margrét was also awarded Starburst Magazine’s Brave New Words Award in 2018 for her editorial work on Pacific Monsters. Read more on her website: https://margrethelgadottir.
John Ajvide Lindqvist is a Swedish author with a background as both a magician and a stand-up comedian. Today he’s a well-known author with several acclaimed novels and short stories, several within horror and fantasy. His debut novel was Låt den rätte komma in (Let the Right One In), in 2004, and his works include novel titles such as Hanteringen av odöda (Handling the Undead), Människohamn (Harbour), Lilla stjärna (Little Star), and also the short story collection Pappersväggar (Let the Old Dreams Die). ‘Border’, one of the short stories in this collection, was made into a feature film in 2019. Lindqvist was also a writer for the television series Reuter & Skoog (1999) and wrote the screenplays for Swedish Television’s drama series Kommissionen (2005) and for the film Let the Right One In, based on his novel. His work has been awarded several times, especially in connection with the script for the film Let the Right One In, but also the Selma Lagerlöf Prize. His work has alsobeen nominated for awards such as Tiptree, Hugo, BFAand Stoker. John is married to the author Mia Ajvide and lives in the archipelago of Roslagen, Sweden. Find out more on his website: www.johnajvidelindqvist.com
Maria Haskins is a Swedish-Canadian writer and reviewer of speculative fiction, who currently lives just outside Vancouver, Canada, with a husband, two kids, a snake, several birds, and a very large black dog. Maria’s work has appeared in The Best Horror of the Year Volume 13, Strange Horizons, Black Static, Interzone, Fireside, Beneath Ceaseless Skies, Flash Fiction Online, Mythic Delirium, Shimmer, Cast of Wonders, and elsewhere. Her short story collection Six Dreams About the Train was published by Trepidatio Publishing in 2021. Find out more on Maria’s website: mariahaskins.com, or follow her on Twitter, where she is @mariahaskins.
Karin Tidbeck is a Swedish author who lives and works in Malmö as a freelance writer and translator and writes speculative fiction in Swedish and English. They debuted in 2010 with the Swedish collection Vem är Arvid Pekon? Their English debut, the 2012 collection Jagannath, received the Crawford Award and was shortlisted for the World Fantasy Award. The novel Amatka was shortlisted for the Locus Award in 2018. Their 2021 novel, The Memory Theater, was named one of the best speculative fiction books of the year by The New York Times. Karin’s short fiction is published at Tor.com, Uncanny Magazine, Lightspeed and more. They dedicate their free time to games, historical fencing and Forteana. Find them online at karintidbeck.com and on Instagram as @ktidbeck
Hannu Rajaniemi was born in Finland. At the age of eight, he approached the European Space Agency with a fusion-powered spaceship design, which was received with a polite ‘thank you’ note. Hannu is a co-founder and CEO of HelixNano, a venture- and Y Combinatorbacked synthetic biology startup building the world’s most advanced mRNA platform to enable previously impossible applications across human and non-human biology, including COVID-19, climate and cancer. Hannu studied mathematics and theoretical physics at the University of Oulu and Cambridge and holds a PhD in string theory from the University of Edinburgh. He co-founded a mathematics consultancy whose clients included the UK Ministry of Defence and the European Space Agency. He is the author of four novels including The Quantum Thief (winner of the 2012 Tähtivaeltaja Award for the best science fiction novel published in Finland and translated into more than twenty languages). His most recent book is Summerland, an alternate-history spy thriller in a world where the afterlife is real. His short fiction has been featured in Slate, MIT Technology Review and The New York Times.
