The Invoice

Can you put a price on happiness? One man is about to find out…

Karlsson’s wry, whimsical novel excels at describing the simple pleasures of everyday life: it’s as if Kafka decided to look on the bright side

[Karlsson’s] modern-day fable is entertaining, thought-provoking and delivered with good humour.

The Invoice is a refreshingly odd book, told in a distinctive voice with a strong resistance to conformity at its heart.

An original, funny and thought-provoking tale of romance, happiness and modern life.

Offbeat and strangely charming… A delightful debate about happiness.

Jonas Karlsson, one of Sweden's most prominent actors, has performed on Sweden's premier stage and in acclaimed feature films and TV series. Karlsson's playwriting debut, Nocturnal Walk, received rave reviews; spurred by the joy of writing for the stage, Karlsson began writing fiction. His first novel in the UK, The Room, was published last year.

It’s an unremarkable life, I guess, nothing special. I’m in my thirties, I work part-time in a video store in Stockholm, most of my friends are busy with their families, I live alone. I suppose you’d say I have an ordinary life… But I love this city, and even though my flat is small it suits me, I’m comfortable here. In the summer, the sun shines in through my windows at just the right angle and I can hear all the sounds of summer life down in the street. And there’s a really good ice-cream stall just near my building, which sells my favourite flavours. So, ordinary maybe, but happy. Yes, I think it’s fair to say I’m a happy man. And isn’t that enough? 
 
 
A love story and a charming, surreal and funny tale about happiness, The Invoice will change the way you see your life.

The Room

A quirky and unsettling tale, of dark humour and strange realities, about a bureaucrat, an open plan office and a secret room...

A gripping, tense, demonic fable in which the unease is precision-tooled and the turns of the screw wholly unexpected.

The Room is the most effective chapbook on workplace comportment since Glengarry Glen Ross. Hats off!

Nick Offerman, Ron Swanson in Parks and Recreation

Thoroughly enjoyable… If you read only one novel by a famous Swedish actor translated into English this year, make it The Room

Kafka meets The Office in this hilarious and chilling Swedish fable of workplace politics

The novel works both as a glorious satire of the modern workplace and as a psychological drama played through the eyes of Bjorn, a pedantic and thoroughly unreliable narrator. As entertaining as it is disturbing to be in his mind, I was both intrigued and entertained.

This is a very funny book about a magical room, but it is also a familiar, humane story about alienation and intolerance, set during a bleak Swedish winter

The Room deftly creates an intense mood that remains unbroken for the short, enjoyable period this novella takes to read

It’s a brilliant nightmare with a terrific ending

For all its sinister Kafkaesque traits, Jonas Karlsson’s The Room…packs several hilarious punches.

A Beckettian drama in an open plan office

The Room is partly disturbing, partially very funny ... Jonas Karlsson masterfully tells us about his main character's Kafkaesque adventure

Minimalism and surrealism, bundled in a short but powerful novel by Jonas Karlsson, one of Sweden's most successful authors of the moment

The Room is a contemporary version of The Trial by Franz Kafka: the same alienating and disruptive bureaucratic environment and the same hopeless struggle of the individual in the large, historically evolved system

A flawless novella that you will finish with a smile

The Authority looks favourably upon meticulousness, efficiency and ambition. Bjorn has all of this in spades, but it's only in the Room that he can really shine. Unfortunately, his colleagues see things differently. In fact, they don't even see the Room at all. 
 
The Room is a short, sharp and fiendish fable in the tradition of Franz Kafka, Samuel Beckett and Charlie Kauffman. If you have ever toiled in an office, felt like the world was against you or questioned the nature of reality then this is the novel for you.

Jonas Karlsson

Neil Smith

In this trilogy of novellas, Jonas Karlsson explores the quirkier side of human nature, helping us to see the world anew via three eccentric narrators. 
 
Firstly, jobsworth Bjorn starts a new career and expects to progress quickly with his meticulousness and efficiency. But he only gets the recognition he deserves in the Room which, it transpires, only he can visit. 
 
Next, a man with a seemingly unremarkable life -- a job in a video store, a small flat, no partner, one good friend and a nice ice cream shop nearby -- receives an enormous invoice for his ‘experienced happiness’. Unable to pay, he sets out to discover how, exactly, his happiness bill was calculated. 
 
Finally, in The Circus, published in the UK for the first time, two old friends decide to visit a circus together. When Magnus disappears during a magic trick, our protagonist is consumed by the need to find him. And yet, as with any Karlsson story, things aren’t quite what they seem…

Jonas Karlsson

Books by Jonas Karlsson

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