Lyrical and devastating, The Singularity is a breathtaking study of grief, migration, and motherhood from one of Sweden's most exciting contemporary novelists.
In an unnamed coastal city filled with refugees, the mother of a displaced family calls out her daughter's name as she wanders the cliffside road where the child once worked. The mother searches and searches until, spent from grief, she throws herself into the sea, leaving her other children behind. Bearing witness to the suicide is another woman--on a business trip, with a swollen belly that later gives birth to a stillborn baby. In the wake of her pain, the second woman remembers other losses--of a language, a country, an identity--when once, her family fled a distant war.
Balsam Karam weaves between both narratives in this formally ambitious novel and offers a fresh approach to language and aesthetic as she decenters a white European gaze. Her English-language debut, The Singularity is a powerful exploration of loss, history, and memory.
Intertwining the lives of two mothers grieving their children and their countries in differing ways, The Singularity explores the experiences of displacement and survival with inventive, stylish prose. While one woman wanders the streets in search of a missing child, her family struggle to survive in poverty. Meanwhile, another woman recounts her story of finding belonging in a country she can’t call her own.
Karam’s command of language is nothing short of stunning. As she weaves one story into another, the history of each character slowly paints a larger picture of the impacts of war and oppression. Despite the seemingly insurmountable barriers her characters face, it is their perseverance and glimmers of hope that will leave you most moved.
- Jamil
