Paradísarborgin
Paradísarborgin ('the city of paradise') is a 2009 novel by Óttar M. Norðfjörð, published by Sögur in Reykjavík. Form. The novel is a third-person prose account divided into four books: 'Þeir missa sem eiga' ('those who own, lose'); 'Af mold' ('about earth'); 'Leitin að lífshamingju' ('the search for happiness in life'); and 'Til himna' ('to the skies'). These are divided into short, untitled sections with a pixellated greyscale image representing the fungus whose growth is key to the plot. These images get progressively larger as the book goes on. The novel contains no proper nouns. The main character  is known only as the 'einhenti maðurinn' ('the one-handed person'), and other characters in similar ways, often in relation to the main character: the 'eldri bróðir' ('elder brother'), his mother and father, the 'nágrannakona' ('woman from over the road'), and so forth. Likewise, the city where the story is set is unnamed, though its geography is consistent with Reykjavík. In the estimation of Ólafur Guðsteinn Kristjánsson, 'the decision to name neither characters nor the place is good, giving the work a certain exotic touch, even if it is clear what the model for the city is'. Eiríkur Örn Norðdahl  has compared the fantastic content of the work to that of José Saramago, 'if a tad more sci-fi-ish and less style-orientated', while Ólafur Guðsteinn Kristjánsson has compared it with "The Stuff". Plot. The story focuses on the one-handed man, and is a character study of this self-conscious, somewhat anxious and melancholic figure. After living abroad and working as a portrait artist, he has moved home to his mother's following the death of his father seven months before the story takes place. The one-handed man was close to his father and feels the bereavement  keenly, and has been unable to paint since. The novel has two main plot threads: Ólafur Guðsteinn Kristjánsson has pointed out that aspects of the first plot thread reflect Óttar's own artistic responses to the death of his own father. Commentators have noted the relevance of the second plot thread to the 2008–11 Icelandic financial crisis, though Eiríkur Örn has noted that 'the author did at some point stress that it in fact wasn't about the crisis'.