
Reykjavík, the near-future. Society is divided by a development in social technology—a diagnostic tool called The Empathy Test that measures compassion or amorality. In less than two months, a national referendum will determine whether 'marking' each citizen with their results of the test will become compulsory. Four main characters—Vetur, Eyja, Óli, and Tristan—face dilemmas of agency and autonomy while navigating their everyday desires and duties. As the dawn of irreversible changes in healthcare ethics, socioeconomic stability and the cultural fabric draws nearer, the mark of judgment lays bare the balance of their personal and political loyalties and conflicts. Polyphonic and profound, probing and perturbing, The Mark is a fresh and confident take on populism, polarization, and partisanship. Powerful, compulsively readable and radically contemporary, it asks us whether we want to live in a world defined by faith in each other, or fear of the future...
Author

Fríða Ísberg is an Icelandic author based in Reykjavík. Her novel THE MARK won The P.O. Enquist Award, The Icelandic Women’s Literature Prize for Fiction, The Icelandic Booksellers Choice Award, and she is the 2021 recipient for The Optimist Award, handed by the President of Iceland to one national artist. Her short story collection ITCH was nominated for The Nordic Council Literature Prize in 2020. Fríða is a member of the writer's collective Svikaskáld and her writing has appeared in The Times Literary Supplement, The Southern Review, The Iowa Review, and more. Her work has been or is to be translated into 19 languages.