Amid all this death and rebirth, the teenage Máni Steinn was selling himself to men throughout the capital city-that is, at least according to Sjón, in his highly anticipated new novel, Moonstone: The Boy Who Never Was. On December 1, a royal retinue arrived from Denmark to formally grant Iceland its independence, and more than seven centuries of foreign rule came to an end. By the end of that month, the Spanish influenza had arrived in Reykjavik, and it was just a matter of weeks before the conflagration had torn through the country, leaving a devastating toll. In October of 1918, the Katla Volcano erupted for the first time in half a century, and the sky filled with fire and ash. … there is no cause to resort to drastic and costly preventative measures, since the mortality rate must be regarded as within acceptable limits.The dramatic circumstances surrounding Iceland’s independence seem to have been carefully conjured up to pay poetic tribute to the history of the island-nation, the land of Vikings and sagas, the sparsely-populated country that traverses the year first in perpetual darkness and then in unending light. There are echoes of our own, present-day early reactions to a new pandemic in the initial responses of the authorities to the outbreak of disease: But his life is full of moments that transcend these bare facts.Īlthough Mani’s sexual encounters are with men, he is captivated by a slightly older girl, the mysterious, motorcycle-riding Sola G, who brings some colour to his life, representing the freedom offered by the silver screen, and the possibility of invention, or re-invention. Mani should seem a hopeless character: he’s alone in the world, poor, uneducated and illiterate. Reykjavik has, for the first time, assumed a form that reflects his inner life: a fact he would not confide to anyone. Mani is something of an outsider, a people-watcher who spends his time hustling for sex and watching silent movies, but who is later recruited by a doctor to help with the casualties. The narrative focuses around 16-year-old gay orphan Mani Steinn, at a time of immense change for Iceland, with the arrival of the so-called Spanish Flu, the recognition of Icelandic independence by Denmark at the end of World War I and the eruption of the huge Katla volcano.

Set in Reykjavik in 1918, this one is a short (hurray!), intense novel. I wish I’d counted the three “extra” books I read earlier in the summer! (Though that would mean going back and writing reviews.)

Time is whizzing by and I’m not sure if I’m going to get through all the 20 books on my list.

Moonstone by Sjón