On an ordinary day in Bergen, Norway, in the late 1980s, Anna is reading in the garden while her two-year-old daughter, Laura, plays on her tricycle. Then, in one startling moment, Anna misreads a word, an alternate universe opens up, and Laura disappears. Twenty years or so later, life has gone on as if nothing happened, but in each of the women's lives, something is not quite right. Both Anna and Laura continue to exist, but they are invisible to each other and forgotten in each other's worlds. Both are writers and amateur pianists. They are married; Anna had two more children after Laura disappeared, and Laura is expecting a child of her own. They worry about their families, their jobs, the climate-and whether this reality is all there is. In the exquisite, wistful, slyly profound Present Tense Machine, Gunnhild Oyehaug-called "one of the most exciting writers working today" by the bestselling author Jenny Offill-delivers another dazzling renovation of what fiction can do: a testament to the fact that language shapes the world.

From the author of Wait, Blink and Knots, a playful and transcendent novel about language, family, and parallel universes.

About the Author
Gunnhild Oyehaug is an award-winning Norwegian poet, essayist, and fiction writer. FSG has published her story collection Knots as well as her novel Wait, Blink, which was adapted into the acclaimed film Women in Oversized Men's Shirts. Oyehaug lives in Bergen, where she teaches creative writing. Kari Dickson was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, and grew up bilingual. She has a BA in Scandinavian studies and an MA in translation. Her translation of Brown by Hakon Overas and Oyvind Torseter won the 2020 Batchelder Award. Before becoming a translator, she worked in theater in London and Oslo. She teaches in the Scandinavian department at the University of Edinburgh.


Book Information
ISBN 9780374237172
Author Gunnhild Oyehaug
Format Hardback
Page Count 176
Imprint Farrar, Straus & Giroux Inc
Publisher Farrar, Straus & Giroux Inc
Weight(grams) 300g