Photo: Mickael Tannus
Femtiofem meter under ytan
Fifty-five Meters Below the Surface
2024, Children's
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Conny Palmkvist
Conny Palmkvist (b. 1973) is a writer, editor and literary critic. Having made a name for himself writing historical fiction for adult readers, Palmkvist was in 2020 awarded for his children’s book debut in a manuscript contest hosted by one of Sweden’s largest children’s book publishers. The jury praised his unique tone and dark sense of humor. His signature is, and will always be, his close perspective, as well as the poetic undercurrents of his texts. Palmkvist lives with his family in Helsingborg in southern Sweden. To date, he has written three breathtaking time travel adventures for children.
Awards
| The Swedish Writers’ Fund Sweden | 2022 |
| Bonnier Carlsen Children’s Book Award (third prize) Sweden | 2022 |
| Gisela and Oscar Trapp Memorial Prize Sweden | 2021 |
| Lengertz Literature Prize Sweden | 2021 |
| Selma Award Sweden | 2015 |
| Umeå Short Story Prize Sweden | 2009 |
| Jon of the Year Sweden | 2009 |
| Helsingborgs Dagblad’s culture prize Sweden | 2007 |
Bibliography
Related news
New title: ‘Fifty-five Meters Below the Surface’
The house across the yard is about to be demolished, but something is not right. Inside, a curtain suddenly flutters, one Bengt Gustav has never seen before. He enters the house even though he isn’t supposed to, and on the second floor he finds a door marked “1984.” It becomes the first in a series of time-travels, where Bengt Gustav is given the opportunity to fix everything that has gone wrong for his father through the years, all the things his father blames his alcoholism on. Only, things never get any better.
The only calm place left to Bengt Gustav is the water. Lowering himself into the bathtub, he thinks about Guillaume Néry, who for a long time held the world record in freediving. In the water, Bengt Gustav sees his lifeboat from below, the one he is in all by himself. The lifeboat that will save him when his father derails.
Bengt Gustav finally realizes that he has to let more people onto his lifeboat, right now. That will be the only way he and his father can find a way forward.
Fifty-five Meters Below the Surface is a warm, beautiful novel for middle graders about keeping your head above the surface and letting other people in.
New Title: ‘Four Minutes Past Midnight’
Why do parents die? How can it even be allowed to happen? Nicolaus is still only a child and parents shouldn’t die. But on this night in July, nothing is as it should be.
Twelve-year-old Nicolaus watches over his mother’s sick bed alongside his father. It’s nighttime and all is quiet on ward thirty-four as Nicolaus is growing restless. He realizes he can’t stand to just sit around and wait for his mum to die; he needs to get away. In the elevator he sees a button that wasn’t there before. When he presses it, the elevator doors close and transport him to a very different kind of place.
It’s four minutes past midnight when he arrives to the Final station. It’s where everyone goes at some point. Or is it? Somehow, Nicolaus has stopped time two minutes before his mom will die. But what do you do if you discover that you can stop time, and even travel in time? Can you change the past – or the future?
Four Minutes Past Midnight is a unique, heartfelt, and beautiful children’s novel written in a sensitive, warm tone with a sprinkling of subtle humor.