The weather is marvellous and we're relaxing after a few weeks on the road. Tour de France is on TV and I'm browsing through Karina Demuth's Ny i Haven, a beautiful book which outlines what to think about when being new to gardening. It was a present from my sister-in-law and her husband and I will definitely read it more carefully when today's thrilling Tour de France stage is over.

Sara Granér has written and illustrated a very funny book, All I Want for Christmas Is Planekonomi, in which she first and foremost criticizes today's profit-oriented focus on usability in a wonderful manner. I can't help thinking that this is an extremely relevant book in an era when companies and right-wing politicians set the agenda. The fact that the author takes a stance in the area where we live makes it even more hilarious. Love it.

One of my presents from T. was a beautiful book called Dekorera vackert written by florist Minna Mercke Schmidt. Yesterday was a pretty horrible day for several reasons, but today has, so far, proved to be far more enjoyable and at the moment I'm thinking about how to decorate the table for the New Year's Eve dinner. Inspiration is definitely provided in abundance by Mercke Schmidt and I'm sure T.'s sister, a gardener who is amazingly good at flower decorations herself, and I will join efforts to create something nice tomorrow.

The photos above are borrowed from Minna Mercke Schmidt's own blog, Blomsterverstad.

Both Haroun and the Sea of Stories and Luka and the Fire of Life are amazing examples of the giddy art of storytelling almost bursting at its seams. To read them is a treat, and it adds to the feeling of happiness as I, today, have been both promoted and granted a quite substantial raise. It has definitely been a good day from that perspective.

There is a downside, however. The temperature in our house plummeted yesterday as the radiators stopped working, and, since it is quite cold outside, we really needed the fireplace to keep us warm. The bedrooms were freezing cold, but fortunately our thick duvets kept us warm. The indoor temperature has gradually become worse and worse over the last few weeks, we believe. We dreaded to have to tell our landlords, since our relationship to them is rather strained especially since they haven't done anything at all to the dishwasher that broke down three weeks ago, but at the same time we were worried to have to spend the weekend without any heat. We contacted them and took the opportunity to ask about the dishwasher as well. None of it was well received.

T. tried to read up on heat pump maintenance online and we also called an HVAC repair company and a friendly man gave us a few pointers. T. was amazing and managed to clean the filters and reset the pump a few times, before it actually began to work properly again this morning and we were happy to be able to tell the landlord this. There is no news on the dishwasher, though, except that the landlord supposedly had tried for these three weeks to get someone to come here but that they were "all busy." We then contacted a repair man we had been in contact with before and he said he would be able to come today if we wanted to, but from our description he said that the dishwasher seemed to be beyond repair. We said that we'd have to talk to the landlord and ask if they wanted him to deal with it. It's obvious that the landlord has severe money issues, and we realised that our news probably wouldn't make them jump with joy. We still haven't received a response, but we know that the real estate agent, who is trying to sell this house, has alerted them that this house cannot be sold without a dishwasher that is in order. Moreover, we are paying rent on the basis that all of the equipment works and the only comment we have received from the landlord so far is that we'd "have to do the dishes by hand, then."

With all this as a backdrop it feels great to dive into Salman Rushdie's multifaceted fictive universe, but it certainly helps to have some good news with regard to work, which probably is even more important since this is actually substantial and real — and on top of it all we're warm. I do feel a certain giddiness and lightheadedness at the moment. Happy.

I have read novels by Salman Rushdie for many years, and I have also read about him in various newspapers. Media has often portrayed him as a controversial figure, but there has also been a lot of support for his stance — all of it depending on the newspaper in question, but perhaps also the time.

My own image of this famous author has always been coloured by my reaction to the first novel of his that I read, Midnight's Children. I loved it. The humour and wit found in most of his novels come in abundance in this one, and I simply couldn't believe its author to be even remotely like the image his enemies painted of him.

His memoire, Joseph Anton, tells the story of the (Sal)man behind the "Rushdie affair" and his account of the years living with the fatwa from February 14th, 1989, seems honest, candid, and nuanced. The issue of artistic freedom and the role of religion is placed at the forefront, as it is in so many of his novels. All in all it's a truly wonderful read.

I just received Peter Ødegaard's Ljus och skugga (Light and Shadow), and the book is indeed a treat. Ødegaard works as a florist and an "interior creator" and in this fantastic volume photos from his travels in Italy, Brazil, and Sweden come in abundance. It's funny... it has even inspired my choice of music at the moment — very laid-back with a tinge of Brazil.

All images by Peter Ødegaard.

This is a book I've been looking for for years, but it has been impossible to get hold of, since it has been completely out of stock at the publisher's. Today I managed to find it at a secondhand bookstore in Copenhagen and I didn't hesitate for more than a few seconds — sorry T.!

I already have quite a few books written by the same talented pair, author Dorrit Elmquist and photographer Birgitta Wolfgang Drejer: Nordliv, Sommerhusliv hele året, and Nordlys. Yet another book has been photographed by Birgitta Wolfgang Drejer, Indret ude, but in this case the texts have been written both by her and her sister, Julia Mincarelli. All these books are truly inspirational!

As a teenager I sometimes read the serial stories in my mother's weekly magazine. Most of the time it was quite simple stories of love lost and found, and I didn't really remember them afterwards. One of them caught my attention, however: Margit Sandemo's Kungakronan (The King's Crown). It tells the story of a group of university students heading out to the Norwegian west coast to investigate a possible Celtic archaeologic find. One of them is an archaeology student, one is an almost finished medical doctor, and two of them are in Celtic studies. True to the romance genre, Sandemo focuses quite extensively on the relationships between the the characters, but I have to admit that I found the allusions to Celtic history and the story of the finds much more interesting.

As the years went by, I kept remembering this story. It was at the back of my mind when I toyed with the idea of studying Celtic languages at the university, it surfaced when I met Gaelic-speaking friends in the UK, and it made me read the Arthurian stories with greater interest. I have looked for it now and then over the years, and whereas I did remember the name, Kungakronan, the name of the author was lost to me. Remembering the story again a few weeks ago, I decided to have another go at finding it and this time I did. (Thank God for the Internet!) I ordered it and yesterday I re-read it for the first time, with a knowledge of its influence on my life and how I approach my work. I'd better thank Margit Sandemo for awakening my interest in research and old cultures.

This morning I listened to an interview with Swedish-Finnish author Märtha Tikkanen. She was promoting her new book, which she has been thinking of and planning for many years. Tikkanen told us about an episode, which she has discussed in previous interviews as well, a dream she dreamt at the time when her own children were small and family life was busy. In her dream she saw a woman dressed in black by a window. As she approached her and the woman turned around, she realized that she was looking at an older version of herself and commented that she could hardly believe that there was such peace and quiet around her.

Years later, when her husband had died after a long illness and their children had moved out, Tikkanen went looking for a new place to live and had decided to return to the neighbourhood in which she grew up. The real estate agent had lent her the keys to an apartment that actually was too big and too expensive for her, but she went there nonetheless. When she entered it, she recognized the place by the window she had seen in her dream so many years ago. The address was vaguely familiar as well and she called her aunt to confirm her suspicions. The apartment had indeed, in the 1920's before Tikkanen herself was born, belonged to her beloved grandmother. She brought her aunt to the apartment and she could tell Tikkanen where her grandmother had slept and what it had looked like when she had lived there. Tikkanen later brought her own father there as well, and as they entered the apartment he told her that this was the place where he and her mother had been married.

Realizing that this apartment had played such an important part in her family's history, Tikkanen didn't hesitate to buy it. She stayed there herself for 24 years. Another outcome was that she decided to write her grandmother's story, a book which now has been released. I think the story behind it is interesting and the story of the turbulent relationship between her grandmother Emma and her husband Uno seems equally so. I'll put it on my reading list.

Margaret Atwood is one of my favourite authors, but I've never read Alias Grace before. It's very well written, as always, but the tone is rather different from works set in a not too distant future like The Handmaid's Tale or Oryx and Crake.

A muffin and a cup of red rooibos Kusmi tea are not a bad combination while reading, and in this case I will have to say thank you to my youngest son, who decided to make a whole plate of wonderful chocolate muffins yesterday. He made them for his outing earlier today and brought four huge muffins with him to share with his friends. Luckily there was one left for me as well.

A tough week lies ahead of me, but right now I'm simply enjoying the marvellous weather, our nice balcony, being with the family, and a bit of reading. Pascal Mercier's Night Train to Lisbon is a wonderful read and I somehow don't want it to end too soon.

I'd really like to get hold of Anna and Fanny Bergenström's Sött, sweet, dulce. It's one of those books that seem to be an absolut must for me. I'd really love having some orange salad with walnuts and dark chocolate right now — and I can't — but the cover of this book seems to invoke that type of taste.

T. is away taking care of practical stuff and, although I will be working a lot this upcoming week, I will still miss him. In an attempt to think about other things than him being away, I have decided to start reading Margaret Atwood's The Year of the Flood. I have read quite a few of her novels (the latest one was Oryx and Crake) and I'm really looking forward to seeing a world through her sharp eyes and intellect again. A luxurious hardcopy version of her latest novel is now waiting for my by my bed. I can't wait...

I'm sitting on the couch with a blanket over me browsing books like Lise Septimus Krogh's beautiful Hjem til Jul and Dorrit Elmquist and Birgitta Wolfgang Drejer's inspiring Nordliv, and I also decided to check out some new books at Adlibris. Monika Ahlgren's Monikas Jul and Sanna Töringe's Vintermat both look really good.

Well, well... it's time to get up from the couch, though, and do something useful. It's time for some laundry.

I have finished Salman Rushdie's The Enchantress of Florence and it was truly amazing. I enjoyed every minute of reading it.

In order to explore a completely different genre, and explore something that is highly relevant these days, I decided to turn to President Barack Obama's account of his family's history, Dreams from My Father. I've only read a few pages yet, but it is very interesting to notice how clearly his voice and manner of speaking carries over to the written medium. I'm sure this will be an equally interesting and enjoyable read, albeit very different from Rushdie's trickster tale.

I'm in the middle of a cold at the moment and doing as little physically as possible. Reading is, however, the perfect thing to do and Salman Rushdie happens to be one of my favourite authors. The Enchantress of Florence was released in 2008 but I haven't had time to read it until now. At the moment I'm about 150 pages into it and I have to say that I'm definitely not disappointed. As with most of Rushdie's novels, it seems as if it comes with vibrant colours and fragrances, as if the text is not simply black letters on a white background, as if there is an entire world opening up before me. Apart from occational sneezing, I tend to forget that I'm ill.

Yes, books again... But these I already have. They were given to me for my birthday by my in-laws and I was thrilled to be able to sit in bed that evening, browsing them slowly. Kirsten Steno's Hjem med hjerte (Homes with a heart) tells several stories of homes and their owners and how they managed to create a feeling of home after having been through transition periods in their lives. In many ways it is an unusual interior design book, since the stories are so touching. I really loved it and it got me thinking about my relationship to our own home, which definitely is a temporary one. We will stay here a while longer, definitely not forever, but our rented apartment still needs to feel like a home until it is time to move again.

The second book, Mariette Tiedemann's Arbejdsrum, (Home office/work spaces) is a very hands-on description of work spaces people have created in their own homes. Beautiful images, a lot of good ideas, different styles... I will definitely use many of the ideas from this book when creating home office spaces for us in the future. We badly need it, since both T. and I are working from home a lot.

Yeah, yeah... I know some people feel that I have far too many books already, but I was really happy to see that one of my absolute favourite authors/photographers has released a new book, Indret Ude. Danish Birgitta Wolfgang Drejer has, together with her sister Julia Mincarelli, photographed, designed and written about their favourite gardens spots and it definitely seems to be a must have for me, although we don't have a garden — yet.

The book to the left, Simply Contemporary, was published already in 2006 but it has slipped my radar. Just like Baltic Homes, which I already have in a Swedish version, it was photographed by very talented Norwegian photographer Sølvi Dos Santos.

I read an interview with "Kate Brennan" in The Guardian last week. Brennan, who writes under pseudonym, has just released her memoires called Stalked in Europe. (The American version is called In His Sights.) Brennan describes her puzzlement, anger and finally fear when she realises that the man, with whom she has just ended a two-year relationship, has begun to follow her every move and is even paying other people to "keep an eye on her." She is finally forced to move around in her efforts to get away from this man, but sooner or later he is back on track and he shows that he is by paying people to break into her house, tapping her phone or doing other things that throw her off guard (such as moving in next door). This type of behaviour still continues after 15 years.

To me, Brennan's tale is disturbing on several levels. I, too, was in a similar relationship, although my ex-husband didn't have the means to pursue me the way Brennan's former partner does. I recognize the attempts to gain control and power, however. I remember him following me around, not allowing me to be alone, to think for myself, at any time. I remember him hitting, pulling or shoving me when I didn't do as he wanted. I remember finding the phone bank linked to my private account closed since "somebody" had failed to come up with my password too many times. I remember being yelled at and threatened on the phone. (He said he would take my children away from me.) I remember him interrogating first me, then the children as well as my parents about people I might be seeing or things I was doing. I remember many things.

It actually took me years to create geographical and psychological distance to this man. Unfortunately, as the father of my children, he still can't be completely removed from my life, but I can try to minimize the knowledge he has about my life. I can stop him from calling me and only allow e-mail correspondence (anything in writing can be saved and be used as evidence if the need arise). I try to make sure that the children are safe, and I know they would tell me if anything bad happens. What I have realised and what people in general need to realise is that this kind of behaviour has nothing to do with love. It's about control and the wish to gain power over somebody else. What I find most appalling is how I changed my way of behaving and thinking. My goal became to try to read his mind in an attempt to ward off attacks or at least getting prepared. I came to see it as my responsibility to make sure that he didn't get angry. As a consequence, it, of course, became my fault if he then did. To get out of that kind of thinking takes a while. It also took a while to realise that not everyone is like him, that there are people who actually are trustworthy, people I can talk to and lean on.

I'm thinking of reading Brennan's book, but I'm not sure if I'm up to it even though almost ten years have passed since my divorce. My own memories are bad and tales like Brennan's still haunt me. But I've learned that openness and honesty helps, as does love. Unlike Kate Brennan, I'm so lucky to be in a really good relationship with a really amazing man.

Yes, I know. I should have read this one years ago. But I didn't. I'm actually reading it on my iPod right now, which means that the image above is slightly misleading, but it didn't look as interesting on the e-book cover as this book cover does.

Images from Panda.org and Amazon.com.