The Oslo Book Festival is Norway's largest festival to promote books and reading. From September 17th to 19th the festival filled Oslo with hundreds of small and big literature events, from Karl Johans gate to the Opera House to the House of Literature. The festival is free and open to everyone. One of the guests of this year’s festival was Palestinian-American author Susan Abulhawa, represented internationally by Pontas. Her novel Mornings in Jenin (Morgen I Jenin in Norwegian, published by Aschehoug) is a real bestseller since it was launched last May. Nearly 25,000 copies have been sold in few months in a country with four million inhabitants. (Besides a good amount of copies of the Bloomsbury UK edition in English distributed in Scandinavia!).
Hundreds of people listened to the conversation between Susan Abulhawa and Ragnhild Eikli, her Norwegian translator.
From left to right: Gunn Reinertsen Naess, editor in chief at Aschehoug; Susan Abulhawa, Anna Soler-Pontand Synnove Helene Tresselt (editor at Aschehoug) on the ferry boat going to a wonderful dinner at Asbjorn Overas’s house (the passionated editor of Morgen I Jenin).
Spanish writer Cristina Sánchez-Andrade, author of Los escarpines de Kristina de Noruega (published by Roca Editorial) was also in Oslo during the festival. And Vegard Bye was the best guide in town.