Author(s): Johanna Hedman; Kira Josefsson (translator)

Novel | Sweden | Translated fiction

"An absolutely fantastic debut novel."--Fredrik Backman, author of A Man Called Ove

A deeply atmospheric debut novel about three young people testing the boundaries of intimacy that is being hailed as "the love child of Normal People and Brideshead Revisited."

When Hugo takes a room in the house of one of Stockholm's wealthiest families, he unwittingly invites himself into the lives of people he will be unable to forget: Thora, a beautiful descendant of old money, and her childhood best friend August, who dreams of art. None of them have anything in common, but find themselves irresistibly drawn to each other.
Decades later, a young woman shows up on Hugo's door in New York one morning, hoping to stay with him. She introduces herself as the child of Thora and August, and comes carrying questions about her parents that send Hugo reeling back to his youth--to two euphoric summers in Stockholm, and people to whom he is now a stranger.
Timelessly familiar, tender and exultant, The Trio is a novel about the choices we could have made. About who we may have been, and the relationships that influence and linger on with us, long after they have come to an end.

Review: A smart, elegant and moving novel, all the more impressive for it being Johanna Hedman's debut... The stylish emotional distance of Normal People * The Times *
Sharp, vividly imagined and affecting in a way that both intrigues and captivates * Irish Times *
Fans of Sally Rooney will adore this excellent novel, which has garnered rave reviews * The Bookseller *
The Trio is like the love child of Normal People and Brideshead Revisited. A sublime and elegiac meditation on love, intimacy, freedom and jealousy, it elegantly explores the gulf between our interior lives and the personas we perform - and between ourselves and other people. Hedman's writing (and Josefsson's stunning translation) is staggeringly beautiful. Vivid, effortless, and perceptive to a molecular degree -- Francesca Reece, author of 'Voyeur'
Delicate and beguiling... The Trio spans from Berlin to London to Paris as the [characters] continually renegotiate who they each are to each other, questions of ownership and privilege floating in the background of summers which feel both fleeting and endless * Esquire *

Author Biography: Johanna Hedman was born in Stockholm in 1993. She holds a Master's degree in Peace and Conflict Studies and she has lived and worked in Paris, southern India and New York, where she interned for the Swedish UN delegation. The Trio is her first novel.