The Casket of Time (2013)

A tale on two levels – a powerful journey into myth and time, at once eerily familiar and utterly new!

An exhilarating tale of mystery, memory and magic, alternatively delightful, disturbing, and diverting.

On the other level humans have invented magical caskets, giving them the power to be sealed away from time and to temporarily escape reality, like Mondays and Februaries and rainy days. When bad times are ahead, people crawl into their caskets and wait for better times. But one day, teenage Sigrun‘s casket opens and she is confronted by an abandoned city in ruins, with everyone stuck in black caskets waiting for things to get better. She meets an old lady in a house full of children and archaeological artefacts.  The old lady tells them a tale of a greedy king who conquered the world but yearned to conquer time.  Sigrun sees parallels between the tale and the present-day and realizes it’s up to her and her friends to break an ancient curse and fix the world.

Green Earth Book Honor Award 2020, USA Nominated as the Best Translated Fantasy in Finland 2018, along with Ursula K Le Guin and David Mitchell The Icelandic Literary Prize, for Children and Young People’s Books The West-Nordic Literature Prize 2013 Nomination for The Nordic Council Children and Young People‘s Literature Prize Reykjavik Children’s Literature Prize 2014 Icelandic Booksellers‘ Prize as best teenage book of the year

“I have not previously seen the fairy tale genre so well tied up with a sci-fi story, a fantasy tale and a contemporary drama all at once. It really is elegant and full of surprises. I am therefore not at all surprised that the book has already won a few awards in Iceland. It would not surprise me if it also won the Nordic Council Children and Young People‘s Literature Prize.” Weekendavisen, Denmark

“In The Casket of Time, present, future and past are interwoven with a fantasy world familiar to all but which no-one has inhabited. Within its compelling tapestry of facts, truth, magic and wonder Magnason poses urgent questions about the lifestyles and values of present-day Western society, and about the responsibility each of us bears for the state of the world. The story confronts the concept of time and twists old fairy-tale memories with a passionate creativity.

“A new book by Andri Snær Magnason is always big news, and his fans have had to wait far too long since his last one. Their patience has been amply rewarded with the arrival of The Casket of Time, an extremely entertaining fairy tale, brimming with imagination, that spirits the reader away into an unknown world, both mesmerising and frightening. ... Magnason is a highly entertaining storyteller, and the tale swirls with memorable images, themes both original and familiar, strong characters, and a thrilling plot. ...The message that we need to act no later than now is clear, and yet The Casket of Time does not preach in the slightest – Magnason is much too skilled a writer to do that. The maxim of adventure rules here, and readers of all ages will easily forget time and place as they read. Conclusion: A sparkling and entertaining adventure story in two time eras with a clear moral which, however, never turns into a sermon.” Fridrika Benonysdottir, Frettabladid