With Christmas only just gone, I hope it’s not too late to recommend Ingvild Rishoi’s bittersweet seasonal novella – a bestseller in Norway which now comes into English in Caroline Waight’s crisp and fluent prose. Here’s a child’s-eye story about adult griefs and troubles which uses dramatic irony to consistent effect; a skinny little narrative halfway to being a fable which nevertheless keeps its roots in reality, with mobile phones, Frosties, casual swearing, the workings of child protection services and the logistics and microeconomics of the Christmas tree business.
The narrator, ten-year-old Ronja, and her teenage sister Melissa are growing up in Oslo with their alcoholic single dad. Things are pretty bleak. The girls put on a brave face, terrified of attracting the attention of social services, with all that will follow. They catch a lucky break when Ronja learns of a job locally selling Christmas trees. Dad gets the job! It’s a Christmas miracle! He comes home with armloads of groceries, full of affection and hope and good cheer.
But then, of course, he falls off the wagon and vanishes to the pub. Melissa saves the day by begging to be allowed to take over his job, and Ronja joins her on the lot – her waiflike mien helping to drum up business selling wreaths in aid of ‘children in need’. Melissa’s colleague Tommy offers a pert critique of ‘Christmas spirit’, a.k.a. ‘rich people desperate to find someone to help’: ‘You know who people most want to help at Christmas? More than anybody else in the world? … Skinny little kids.’ A winter storm, meanwhile, is coming.
So here’s a story that has its cake and eats it.
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