Bergen Youth Theatre

Pedro Carmona-Alvarez

Original title: Bergen ungdomsteater
Publisher: Kolon forlag, 2016
Genre: Novel
Pages: 250 pages

Marita has moved to Bergen together with her mother, who asked Marita to call her Kari now, and not mother anymore.
Johannes is the son in a highly educated family, who starts a theatre group at school. He draws words out of his mouth, like baby birds. He says: skinning. Explosion. Marita, look at us. Remember this moment, for good. Be wanton. Like Icarus. Like me, is what he means.
Andreas should have a twin brother, but he hasn’t. A house made of glass; he says when Marita asks about his childhood in the Ibsenstreet.
All three are searching for their future. All three have to find their own way, and the chance to fail is high.

Bergen Youth Theatre is a freestanding sequel to The Weather Changed, Summer Came and So On.

Awards

Dagavisen – Best Books of the Year 2016
Klassekampen – Best books of the year 2016

The sequel to the book that received the P2-listeners literature award is the most beautiful depiction of youth this year. Poetic and wise, about the fragile and insecure phase where everything is open and at stake and stands and falls with friendships; added Bergen in the 1980s and 1990s.

Dagavisen - Best Books of the Year 2016

Carmona-Alvarez can give a sense of the passing of time and several years of growing pains in a single passage. He can capture theater, film, pop music or simply the experience of young people in one bright scene.

Morgenbladet

This novel made me tear up on behalf of all not-reading 13-year-olds who will never experience it.

Klassekampen - Best books of the year 2016

Pedro Carmona-Alvarez

Pedro Carmona-Alvarez was born in La Serena, Chile, in 1972. At the age of ten, he and his family fled to Argentina, and the family later moved to Norway. He made his debut with a collection of poetry in 1997, and has since published several award-winning books. The Weather Changed, Summer Came and So On was longlisted for the Dublin Literary Award in 2017.