Postcard for Annie

No cover — Martin Aitken, Ida Jessen: Postcard for Annie (2022, Steerforth Press)

English language

Published March 19, 2022 by Steerforth Press.

ISBN:: 978-1-953861-22-1

(2 reviews)

Writing with the same narrative generosity, the same belief in the dignity and voice of her characters as Marilynne Robinson, this prize-winning collection of stories follows the inner lives of several women on the brink, or the sidelines, of catastrophe.

From the winner of the Lifetime Award from the Danish Arts Foundation and the 2017 Critics’ Choice Award, Ida Jessen’s A Postcard for Annie traces the tangled emotional lives of women facing moral dilemmas.

A young woman witnesses a terrible accident with unexpected consequences, a mother sits with her unconscious son in a hospital room, a pair of sisters remember their mother’s hands braiding their hair.

In seaside tourist villages and in snowy cities, turbulence destabilizes composed lives, whether through outright violence between strangers or habitual domination between loved ones.

Jessen fills each story with bracing passages that splash with the living world, only to become concentrated in the unfixed, …

Writing with the same narrative generosity, the same belief in the dignity and voice of her characters as Marilynne Robinson, this prize-winning collection of stories follows the inner lives of several women on the brink, or the sidelines, of catastrophe.

From the winner of the Lifetime Award from the Danish Arts Foundation and the 2017 Critics’ Choice Award, Ida Jessen’s A Postcard for Annie traces the tangled emotional lives of women facing moral dilemmas.

A young woman witnesses a terrible accident with unexpected consequences, a mother sits with her unconscious son in a hospital room, a pair of sisters remember their mother’s hands braiding their hair.

In seaside tourist villages and in snowy cities, turbulence destabilizes composed lives, whether through outright violence between strangers or habitual domination between loved ones.

Jessen fills each story with bracing passages that splash with the living world, only to become concentrated in the unfixed, vacillating matter of a human psyche caught between silence and speech, paralysis and action.

1 edition

Stephanie Jane reviewed Postcard for Annie by Martin Aitken

Elegant short stories

4 stars

This collection of six elegant short stories is an interesting book to linger over and ponder. The tales take place in beautifully portrayed Danish locations, often at chilly times of the year, and I loved losing myself in the atmospheres that Ida Jessen evokes. While her prose is concise as, obviously, there isn't space for waffling in a short story, each word warrants its inclusion and has its place. Praise must also be given to Martin Aitken for the sensitive translation which flows effortlessly and still feels recognisably Danish.

Jessen's six stories have a strong originality and, while I found some more memorable than others, each one completely captured my attention at the time of reading it. The women are so real and I appreciated that older women are given space here too. The eponymous story, A Postcard For Annie, a tale of memory, is one of my favourites and …

This collection of six elegant short stories is an interesting book to linger over and ponder. The tales take place in beautifully portrayed Danish locations, often at chilly times of the year, and I loved losing myself in the atmospheres that Ida Jessen evokes. While her prose is concise as, obviously, there isn't space for waffling in a short story, each word warrants its inclusion and has its place. Praise must also be given to Martin Aitken for the sensitive translation which flows effortlessly and still feels recognisably Danish.

Jessen's six stories have a strong originality and, while I found some more memorable than others, each one completely captured my attention at the time of reading it. The women are so real and I appreciated that older women are given space here too. The eponymous story, A Postcard For Annie, a tale of memory, is one of my favourites and I was also particularly taken with An Excursion where a woman whose marriage has begun to grate contemplates a change. Mother And Son is superb mystery which questions the strength of maternal love.

I highly recommend this collection for fans of thoughtful short stories and introverted tales as well as readers of atmospheric Nordic fiction.

Adrián Astur Álvarez reviewed Postcard for Annie by Martin Aitken

Review of 'Postcard for Annie' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

This is a fantastic collection of masterfully written short stories all concerned with mapping the inner and outer contours of women in their complicated relationships to various types of men in the world: husbands, sons, lovers, etc. Jessen's interests are novel and rigorous. Be sure, this is not a "men be like but women be like" thematic gathering. The identities articulated in highly readable prose are as dark and deep as any forest. The result transcends. I have a few stories I came away particularly enthusiastic about but none of the stories here are throwaways. This would make a fantastic book club read because I'm sure readers will connect to these shorts in myriad ways.