Exploring Faroe Islands: 8 books from the islands of sheep

A list of books to read from Faroe Islands

Let us start with one of the newest books on the list this time, shall we? This Faroese take on Nordic Noir recently won the Petrona Award for Best Scandinavian Crime Novel. Isaksen has written no less than 18 Faroese crime novels, but so far only this one and Walpurgis Tide are available in English.

The story follows journalist and amateur detective Hannis Martinsson, as he investigates the circumstances surrounding the discovery of a corpse on a beach. His investigation leads to evidence of more, similar deaths, all of which are linked to a local revolt decades earlier.

William Heinesen is the best-known writer that the Faroe Islands have produced, and The lost musicians is named one of the most important Scandinavian novels of the 20th century. Heinesen wrote mainly in Danish, and when he heard rumours that he was to win the Nobel Prize he requested that his nomination be withdrawn, because he wanted the award to go to an author who had written in Faroese. Several of Heinesen’s works are available in English.

This novel is the story of a group of musicians who find sanctuary in their music during a series of dramatic and tragic events. But there is humour, too, especially in the satirical portrayal of the local sectarians who seek in vain to break the spirit of the musicians. And in the huge blacksmith who is completely at the mercy of his petty-minded wife.

At the post-hunt whale-meat auction, Ketil enthusiastically bids for more meat than he can afford. Thus when Ketil is seventy, he and his wife still struggle to repay their debt. These are the Faroe Islands: sea-washed and remote, with one generation still tied to the sea for sustenance, and a younger generation turning toward commerce and clerical work in the towns.

Heðin Brú was considered the most important Faroese writer of his generation and is known for his fresh and ironic style.

This novel is one of the best-loved twentieth century classics in Danish and Faroese literature, and Barbara is one of the most complex female characters ever written. Beautiful, passionate, innocent, devoted, amoral and completely uncomprehending of her own tragedy.

The novel is based on a Faroese legend about a woman and her marriages to three vicars. The legend takes place in the 17th century, while the novel is set in the 18th century. Despite writing only this one novel, Jørgen-Frantz Jacobsen is the only Faroese writer to achieve international best-seller status. Barbara was originally written in Danish.

An epic novel chronicling the lives of a particular family—nicknamed “the Brahmadells”—against the larger history of the Faroe Islands, from the time of Danish rule, through its national awakening, to its independence.

Filled with colourful characters and various family intrigues, the novel incorporates a number of genres and styles as it shifts from individual stories to larger world issues. There are historical documents, including nineteenth-century medical journals, documents detailing the lives of real historical figures, digressions about religion, a measles outbreak, and many other travails, large and small.

I just have to include Norwegian author here, because this book sounds hilarious.

This is the story of Mattias, whose idol is Buzz Aldrin, second man on the man who was willing to stand in Neil Armstrong’s shadow. Following a series of disasters, Mattias finds himself lying on a rain-soaked road in the desolate, treeless Faroe Islands. With a wad of bills in his pocket and no memory of how he got there. When a truck approaches him, Mattias’s life is about to change. Surrounded by a vivid cast of characters: aspiring pop musicians, Caribbean-obsessed psychologists, death-haunted photographers, and even Buzz Aldrin himself, Mathias starts an odyssey through the world of unconventional psychiatry, souvenir sheep-making, and the space between himself and other people. A journey as remote and personally dangerous as the trip to the moon itself.

Death brings the young woman back to the Faroes, the windswept rocky islands of the north where she has never lived, but which she has always called home. There she finds her stories entwining with those of her ancestors as she searches for a way to connect with Faroese culture. But is “home” just a place name, or something more? This author is Danish with Faroese roots.

The events first written down as the Faroes Saga happened more than one thousand years ago. Tim Ecott draws on the surviving fragments of the saga from ancient documents to bring the story to life anew. The places described here can be easily recognised by anyone who travels to the Faroe Islands today. In this wild Atlantic landscape the saga is living history, and not simply a legend. The adventures of Sigmundur and his loyal cousin Thórir have the heroic truth of the epic tales of men like Charlemagne and King Arthur.

Sigmundur and the golden ring is a new historical YA novel by a British author, I found it mentioned on Farlit, but the only place I have found it for sale online is directly from the publisher. If you can find it anywhere else, please let me know!