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Cleft (2024)

Cleft (2024)

Tomas Aevar Olafsson
2024
366 pages
Fiction

A powerful speculative novel about data, memory, and the cost of transparency. 

A massive data leak shakes the foundations of global society. Those claiming responsibility demand urgent climate action and threaten to expose even the far reaches of the internet unless change comes. Even in the quiet Village, the ripple effects are felt. Young Umbi relocates with his father to Italy, a country gripped by growing unrest. Two decades later, he returns to Iceland to find a society he barely recognizes. But not everyone welcomes his return. Joka and Fransiska, once his closest friends, are preparing the Village for the next great leak, the one that will reveal every last secret. 

Cleft is a vivid, genre-defying novel that blends political urgency with personal reckoning. It’s a story of friendship and fracture, set against the backdrop of a world transformed by radical transparency and digital anxiety. The book explores humanity’s search for higher meaning and how radical forces manipulate trust and belief. Cleft unfolds through secrets and revelations, placing the dual nature of secrecy—both its necessity and its corrosive power—at the center.  

 

Reviews

“A deeply affecting and powerful novel.”

KB, KILJAN, NATIONAL TV

“An immensely ambitious work that succeeds on nearly every level.”

IIA, KILJAN NATIONAL TV