Reviews

• “A harsh and unprejudiced story about Copenhagen’s toughest and socially most vulnerable environments, that at the same time displays an understanding that within all of us there is an innate humanity. /…/ Jonas T. Bengtsson can paint portraits and milieus from Denmark’s back-streets like no other, making you suffer with the thick-skinned individuals whom you wish the best for, but, for good reason, fear the worst. /…/ It hurts like hell, and it’s genuinely credible.”

• “Dark and hard-boiled, written with a sober unsentimentality and an intermittent lyricism.”

• “Unprejudiced and full of respect for society’s most exposed individuals, Bengtsson depicts one of Copenhagen’s bleakest sides.”

• “[In Sus] one hears the thirty-seven chapters as much as one reads them. It’s a form of musical exercise in the hard-boiled but humoristic and, most of all, precise and superb musical style that is Jonas T. Bengtsson’s. He is a master in his universe and of his form of expression.”

• “Jonas T. Bengtsson has written another stark yet thrilling and moving working class novel. /…/ He uses the tools of distillation, minimalism if you want, and carefully parcels out the information so that the reader is continually surprised. /…/ The perspectives are small and tied to Sus’ understanding of her surroundings, but [also touch on] the global issues of ever-growing precarity and ecological derailment, the greatest issues of our time. Making this not only an excellent, but also important novel.”

• “Jonas T. Bengtsson’s rawness and realism is just as outspoken here [in Sus] as in his previous Amina’s Letters, Submarino and A Fairytale, but in the midst of the ruthlessness one also senses a tenderness, an empathy for the peculiar Sus, which makes me think of Stieg Larsson’s boyish avenger Lisbeth Salander, another literary misfit who takes the matter into her own hands. /…/ No matter what, Sus is quite the desperate and fascinating acquaintance for as long as the novel lasts, and if there is a light in the story’s darkness it must be that, even if one is socially, existentially and in other ways excluded, one can step outside the role of victim and become a doer.”

• “There is no doubt that Jonas T. Bengtsson knows the environment he is describing.”

• “Jonas T. Bengtsson is exceptionally skillful in portraying individuals from the Danish underworld. /…/ Bengtsson’s novel is a chilling portrait of a young woman from the shadows of the country whose people are called the happiest in the world.”

• “Sus is a solid adrenaline rush and a view as well as a scent of a young life that could be, and surely is, someone’s horrible reality. Jonas T. Bengtsson’s new novel, like the previous three to come from his pen, should not be missed.”

• “Bengtsson is a sharp storyteller with an exquisite and fluent prose /…/ With a steady hand he guides the reader into the building blocks where the poorest and most socially disadvantaged Danes live.”

• “A dark coming-of-age story.”

• “The Dane Jonas T. Bengtsson has written an uncompromising novel, austere and candid.”

• “Sus tells the story of the struggles of those living on the edge of society – it leaves you breathless and is impossible to put down until the very end.”

• “Bengtsson’s words are small and unyielding, like children’s fists constantly drumming on us and consistently hitting those places that hurt the most.”

• “A cruel and realistic portrait of contemporary Denmark.”

• “A captivating story written by a reputable Danish writer.”