A novel of Iceland—a queer, repellant sort of Iceland at that. The story of a prostitute and her child, victim of her passions, her selfishness, and her ill-fame—and of their attempt to find a place for themselves in a new community which is unfriendly, critical, and unforgiving. Chiefly the story of the daughter—her obsessions with and revulsions from sex, and her relations with two men, the one by morbid fascination and hate and love of a queer sort—the other by appeal to her better nature. Glimpses of effects of industrial unrest in a distant part of the world. A difficult style—not easy reading. (Kirkus review)
