This was a new experience for me, and I have to say that I learned a lot from it. And also found som personal motivations. A couple of months back I signed up for the test-reading of a non-finished script for a book by a young Swedish author, Gabriella P. Kjeilen. I have heard of her main series before, Mellody Looh, but haven’t read them. This new novel she is writing is a stand alone novel set in the same universe and she wanted test-readers who both read the Mellody Looh series and not. I thought it would be a cool experience so I had no expectations at all. Except that I had a hard time figuring out how fantasy would sound in Swedish.

It is not high fantasy which I am used to reading, and since the setting of the book was Sweden, ca 80 years in the future, and mostly in Gothenburg, Swedish worked perfectly (like with Stjärnklart by Lars Wilderäng where he gives detailed descriptions of the city of Gothenburg set in a spaced-out sci-fi scenario). The fantasy part was also a bit hidden and the main focus was on the main character’s personal revenge which reminded me of one of my favorite series Throne of Glass by Sarah J. Maas.

I am not going to go into detail what I thought, that’s up to the author to work with, but I will definitely put a final review up after I have read the final version.

But while critically reading (since I normally enjoy-read) I realized what I myself should think about when I am writing my book. Oh, right, I haven’t made that announcement yet, or have I? Eh, well, I have decided that I will finally realize one of my oldest dreams, I am going to write a book. During the past few months, I have been thinking about the story, the setting, and written down a lot of notes so far. The next step I guess (which I will start with any day now since I am now done with everything: my MSc degree is done and all my students’ grades are set) is to start the actual writing. After thinking hard about this, and making pros and cons lists in my head, I have decided that I will actually try to write it in English. I have a very hard time even imagining a high fantasy world in Swedish. And honestly, for the past 4 years I have written approximately 95% more in English than Swedish. So I don’t think there will be any issues, and if it will, I guess I will just switch to Swedish or ask for help.

It is too early to reveal the plot yet, but I think it will be interesting and I hope original. Thoughts and ideas have been drawn from many of my favorites, but I will of course try my best and make it my own. Stay tuned for updates!