BOOK REVIEW: Heima es hogar en islandés (Heima is home in Icelandic), by Laia Soler

This is one of the latest books I have read (actually the last one if we don’t count the ones for the high school) and I found it a very beautiful book, that’s why I wanted to make a review of it.

I’m going to start by explaining the plot of the novel, and then I going to give my opinion.

The main character of the story is Laura, a Spanish girl who suffers from achromatopsia, an illness that makes her only see in black and white. She is kind of overwhelmed by all the fights between her parents after they have divorced, plus she has just broken up with her boyfriend, so she decides to get away from everything and take the first plane on the airport. She ends up in Reykjavik, in Iceland. There she meets Orri, a boy who invites her to join him and his friend on a road trip around the island. It may not be a sensible idea, but she accepts it and joins the adventure with these two unknown boys. What she could have never imagined is that those boys have a big secret, that is going to change her forever.

 

"Just a few things are impossible by themselves, it's us, the people, who decide what is possibe and what is not"

I have to declare myself guilty of judging a book by its cover, but it was impossible to resist with this one. When I saw the cover I just fell in love with it and adding the fact that I’m an Iceland lover, I knew I had to buy it. Actually, when we were in 3^rd of ESO, we had to do a project about a country and one of the parts of the project consisted on designing a one week trip around the country. I worked on Iceland and I felt in love with the landscapes of the country, so when I read the plot of this book, that mentions a road trip around Iceland, I was sure I was going to like it, because it surely involved all the beautiful landscapes. And it didn’t disappoint me.

"Between the two of us, we created a whole smile."

Laia Soler, the author

The best thing of this book is the description of the landscapes and the photos that it includes. The author describes everything very carefully, explaining the details and it makes you transport to where the action is happening. Another thing that makes this book special is the magic. I don’t want to give big spoilers, but it has fantastic elements that combined with the setting of the book, makes you be surrounded by a magic atmosphere.

Maybe the weak spot of the book is the action. I don’t want you to think that is all about describing landscapes and there isn’t any action at all, because at one point there is a big cliffhanger, something that I didn’t expect at all. But in some parts the story is a little slow, so you wish something else happened.

"The world would be a better place if we stopped clinging that much to the logic and we allowed ourselves to believe a little bit more in what we don't see."

Now, talking about the main characters I liked them all. Laura, the main character, was a quite normal girl. About her, we could highlight her pidheadedness in some situations, and the fact that she suffers achromatopsia, which has a storyline about it. And also the little evolution that she suffers during the trip, that makes her think about herself and her life.

The other main characters are the two friends: Orri and Gudjon (or John, like Laura calls him). Orri became my favourite character from almost the beginning, because he always added a little bit of humour and happiness in the situations. Gudjon was a serious guy and at the beginning I didn’t like him very much, but then I started liking him more and at the end, when I knew the reason of his seriousness, I liked him a lot more.

 

"Your aura looks like the northern lights."

Summarizing, this is a very magical and emotional book, maybe with a slow rythym, but with very special characters. We could say that it has a bittersweet ending but at the same time it is very beautiful, just like its story.

And finally, this is the book's official song:

P.S. The original versión of the book is in Spanish, and it actually it hasn’t been translated to any other languages, that’s why I have put the several quotes in Spanish and then I have translated them.