Deborah Levy is now in her 50s and her life is falling apart. The marriage has broken up, the mother is dying and the daughters are on their way out into the world. Levy herself is desperately looking for a place to write and eventually finds it – in a tool shed under an apple tree in a friend's garden.
With effortless elegance, Deborah Levy moves between past and present, between small everyday situations and sharp literary observations, and the result is an exuberant portrait of a writing woman's life, full of wit, depth and human insight. The trilogy became an international phenomenon, praised for its elegant, genre-breaking style, also by Danish reviewers, and has been called a modern coming-of-middle-age. Levy herself calls it a 'living autobiography', written while life rages around her and not in the clear light of reflection.
The reviewers wrote :
"As soon as I had read The Cost of Life to the end, I wanted to start over... Levy is at once splendidly read and completely free in his movement through the text." ♥♥♥♥♥ Politiken
"Fabulous... Deborah Levy excels in the art of writing so passionately about the personal that it becomes universal, and the sparks leap from the pages and leave a shining splinter in the reader's eye." ★★★★★ Jyllands-Posten
"Levy is really funny in this two, but she's also tart, elegant and hyper-literary." Information
"In the second volume of her memoir trilogy, Deborah Levy is seized by the attention-enhancing attributes of the state of chaos, and so does the reader. The costs of life almost tremble in the hand thanks to the almost manic energy with which it is written.' Weekend newspaper
"The obvious precision of the words, the twinkling, unsentimental and dryly humorous tone, have also found their way nicely into the Danish translations." Kristeligt Dagblad
"If you loved Things I Don't Want to Know [...], then you will be blown away by The Cost of Life . It is one of those rare books that you will come back to several times in your life.''
» I LOVED The Cost of Life by Deborah Levy! Perfect, compact combi of something thought-provoking, something funny, something existential and something sharp - and all the time super elegant and quotable worded!« Book review
"Once again I was completely absorbed and blown away by Deborah Levy's beautiful language, beautiful metaphors and fine reflections on life and living it." Bogblogger.dk
»Deborah is sharp and the book is full of goodies... Do yourself a favor, pop down to your bookstore and get your hands on The Costs of Life - now!« ★★★★★★ The Book Gang
"Now it [...] is not the child's perspective, but the grown-up writing woman, mother and daughter, who tries to make life come together; an electric bike to get up the hill, and a shed of one's own to write in while the apples rattle down on the roof. A really colorful and cute bi-character gallery helps the plot along and teaches us something about different communities... As far as I understand, Vinter has bought all the rights, so I'm looking forward to Real Estate too! Am emotionally invested now, sgu.« Litteratur.dk
The trilogy consists of
Things I don't want to know
Cost of living
Real estate
The author
Deborah Levy (b. 1959 in South Africa) is an award-winning author, poet and playwright. She made her novel debut in 1989 and has since published a large number of novels, short story collections, poetry collections and plays. She was associated with the Royal Shakespeare Company as a playwright for a number of years and has twice been shortlisted for the prestigious Booker Prize for the novels Swimming Home (2013) and Hot Milk (2016). She has received several awards for her trilogy, including the distinguished Prix Femina.
