Syskonfejden

Syskonfejden The Inheritance

As three grieving siblings greet mourners at a funeral, it emerges two of them have filed serious police charges against the third. What has irrevocably torn this family apart?

In the wake of their father’s recent death, Ulrika, Andrea and Rasmus gather in the childhood home to celebrate their mother’s birthday and the remnant of the family struggle to re-establish their previously entrenched roles. Middle sister Andrea is keen to form the same tight-knit bond that her older sister Ulrika has always shared with their mother. It doesn’t seem to matter how much of an effort she makes, she still feels left out. Ulrika rather sees a little sister who’s had everything in life, been the apple of their father’s eye and always had her will be done – yet still never seem satisfied. Their much younger brother Rasmus has in turn lived his whole life in the shadow of his sister’s incessant fight for attention and validation.

When it emerges that several items mysteriously have gone missing from the childhood home, everything is brought to a head. Three vastly differing childhood experiences come to clash. But who really owns the narrative of a childhood? What focal events have some of them been kept in the dark about? Can you always trust your memories? And what do we truly owe our siblings?

Reviews

  • “The master of relationships, Moa Herngren, is finally back with a novel about the delicate nature of relations and how the people we know best sometimes can feel like total strangers.”

    Smålandsposten, Sweden

  • “Sure thing, she does it again! Moa Herngren is masterly and utterly phenomenal at depicting relationships and conflicts that move, engage and create recognition. (…) The various perspectives and family roles are portrayed so skillfully. Hats off, I take a bow for yet another fantastic reader’s experience that I will not soon forget. /…/ The well-formulated language flows smoothly and the carefully constructed and well-thought-out sentences at times become like poetry and is a pure delight to read. I’m impressed by the planted details and savour certain comments that are so very spot on! (…) [Moa Herngren] has her very own tone and achieves to create a captivating and immersive plot that is impossible to shy away from. The, at first glance, given behaviours manages to repeatedly surprise me with unexpected turns. /…/ The novel awakens plenty of thoughts and reflections, which makes it an excellent bookclub-title.”

    Agneta Norrgård, Literary Critic, Sweden

  • “[Moa Herngren is] a true master at constructing these tense atmospheres and conflicts, the lack of communication. /…/  The tone is so pitch perfect it gets me thinking ‘what has Moa Herngren herself been through to be able to write this credibly about being set aside and feeling misunderstood and left out?’”

    TV4 Nyhetsmorgon, Sweden

  • “If someone’s to write about sibling problematics it surely ought to be Moa Herngren, who in the last couple of years have written two impressive novels about complicated family relationships, The Mother-in-Law and The Divorce. In both novels she has achieved to shine a light on the different sides in a conflict, so well that one truly comes to understand the different perspectives. This, she also accomplishes in The Inheritance, which is sprinkled with skilfully selected family details when the siblings in question begin to clear out their dad’s left behind belongings. /…/ Moa Herngren has got a knack for highlighting an array of less flattering characteristics in us all, but also for explaining them so well that it feels like reading an unusually talented family therapist.”

    Dagens Nyheter, Sweden

  • The Inheritance makes me forget to both eat and sleep. /…/ Skilfully told from different perspectives, where everyone owns their truth and their experience.”

    M-Magasin, Sweden

  • “[Herngren] picks up on those themes that we all can relate to, in one way or another. /…/ When I open a book by Moa Herngren nowadays I always expect to be given a reader’s experience of high quality. The Inheritance is no exception. The novel moves its readers when we encounter three siblings that all have the same parents, but haven’t had the same childhood that being said.”

    Blekinge Läns Tidning, Sweden

  • “Yet again Moa Herngren has written a relationship novel that moves you and that many likely can relate to. In The Inheritance she excels with a razor sharp and very skilfully told narrative about family relations and how vulnerable one can feel in one’s own family. /…/ [E]ven with expectations set sky high this turned out to be a reader’s experience that delivered extra everything. Moa Herngren is the queen of family dramas. (…) The Inheritance takes a given place among the best novels of the year! Outstanding is the only thing I can say, Moa Herngren!”

    ★★★★★

    Melleruds Nyheter, Sweden

  • “Moa Herngren offers up a thrilling drama with an absolute pitch for messy relationships. The siblings are given the word one by one and nothing appears to be as it seems. First your sympathies lie with Andrea, then with Ullis and then with Rasmus. The truth seems hard to pin down, shifts shape and lies in the eye of the beholder!”

    Femina, Sweden

  • “In some ways there’s a constantly ongoing power battle in [The Inheritance] that I believe many siblings will be able to see themselves in.”

    Sveriges Radio, Sweden

  • “[Herngren] is just so great. Incredible language. (…) A brilliant set-up for a novel. /…/ It’s so clever, so intelligently written. So many layers, just like there is in real families – that’s what’s so darn nice, there’s so much recognition. /…/ Thrilling and high relatability.”

    The Bokklubb Podcast, Sweden

  • “Moa Herngren is the master of depicting relationships.”

    Hemmets Veckotidning, Sweden

  • “In her new novel The Inheritance, Moa Herngren explores the painful conflicts that can arise between siblings in the wake of a parents’ death. By depicting different perspectives, both from the view of the person organizing it all and from the person receiving all the reminders, Herngren shines a light on the complex dynamic there.”

    Svenska Dagbladet, Sweden

Author
Moa Herngren
Published
2024
Genre
  • Fiction
Pages
444
Reading material

Swedish edition

English summary

Rights sold

Denmark, Grønningen 1

Finland, Gummerus

Germany, Kein & Aber

Iceland, Ugla

Norway, Kagge

Poland, Albratros

Slovenia, HKZ

Sweden, Norstedts

Ukraine, Nora-Druk

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