American novelist Christina Sunley, the writer of The Tricking of Freya, will read and discuss her debut novel inspired by her Icelandic heritage at the Scandinavia House – the Nordic Center in America in New York on March 31.
A Scandinavia House press release described that Sunley grew up hearing about the experiences of her Icelandic grandparents, including the story of how her grandfather’s family fled a massive volcanic eruption in Iceland in 1875.
The eruption had left the land and its people devastated, and many, including Sunley’s ancestors, immigrated to Canada where a “New Iceland” colony was formed, bringing their language, literature, mythology and love of genealogy with them to their new home.
In The Tricking of Freya, Sunley tells the fictional story of a woman in search of a mysterious relative and a family secret that takes her from a small Icelandic village in Canada to the volcanoes, glaciers, and chasms of Iceland itself.
