---
product_id: 14541270
title: "Reply to a Letter from Helga Paperback – January 29, 2013"
brand: "bergsveinn birgissonphilip roughton"
price: "€ 20.18"
currency: EUR
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 13
url: https://www.desertcart.com.cy/products/14541270-reply-to-a-letter-from-helga-paperback-january-29-2013
store_origin: CY
region: Cyprus
---

# Reply to a Letter from Helga Paperback – January 29, 2013

**Brand:** bergsveinn birgissonphilip roughton
**Price:** € 20.18
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

## Quick Answers

- **What is this?** Reply to a Letter from Helga Paperback – January 29, 2013 by bergsveinn birgissonphilip roughton
- **How much does it cost?** € 20.18 with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.com.cy](https://www.desertcart.com.cy/products/14541270-reply-to-a-letter-from-helga-paperback-january-29-2013)

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## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐ 3.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    Reply to a narrator from Norway
  

*by B***S on Reviewed in the United States on February 10, 2014*

To be fair, this book could get more stars perhaps if I understood its Icelandic historical references outlined at the end of the book.  I enjoy first person unreliable narrator novels as this is.  For the most part it was a good book.  Not great but short enough for me to want to keep reading to the end.  Difficult the critique succinctly but it seemed to ramble a bit much and I would say that the author could have edited it a bit more.  Some nice writing though and still a nice little read.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 4.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    Reply to a Letter From Helga
  

*by C***N on Reviewed in the United States on April 30, 2019*

Reply to a Letter From Helgaby Bergsveinn Birgisson,Philip Roughton (Translator), Kjartan Hallur (Illustrator)Bjarni, a sheep farmer in an isolated village in Iceland, lives with his infertile wife whose botched uterine operation has made her unable to take physical or emotional pleasure in lovemaking. Into his life comes Helga, a richly sensuous married woman who makes him feel alive in ways he never has. They had an affair during the era of World War II. That could sum up this book in one sentence, but this book is much, much more than that. A lyrical and poetic meditation on the things that matter most in life, the novel focuses on a man who is torn between the love of his life and his true sense of self. Bjarni has long held on to a letter from former lover Helga, with whom he shared an illicit, impassioned love. Her letter invited him to leave his wife and his farm and pursue prosperity in the city, where World War II had brought an influx of American marines and opportunities for work. But he chose not to reply.We learn of a man who loved the country and loved his animals and loved a woman. He loved a woman that was not his and a land that was very much his own. He made decisions that seemed to him to be practical and right yet he was always unsure if he were true to himself or not. Should a man be with his love in a soulless, empty landscape or should he remain free in the wilderness that is a part of him yet be unloved? As he narrates the tale of his life to his love we learn quite a bit about Bjarni and about the old ways of sheep-herding and how people lived in a harsh world where they only had each other and their animals and nothing outside themselves and their farms to sustain them - no cell phones, no computers, no fancy technology that would throw a wedge between them although there were plenty of conventions to divide people - forbidden lust being one of them.Years later, as he reflects on a long and simple life among the sheep in the Icelandic hillsides, he finally finds himself ready to explain why. The lure of the land is seen in the ordinary and the extraordinary – the annual sheep round-ups, on men going over the same fundamentals and politics at the local co-op, of neighbourly communions in the nearby Reading Club. Bjarni reflects, “I’ve heard my stomach grumble back at the thunder, a little man beneath a big sky; heard the stream whisper that it’s eternal. Made the earth my beloved. Held a powerful salmon. Let a fox teach me what it is to be clever.”Man’s existential dilemma, Bjarni believes, “consists of having to choose everything in this world, which is the root of his unhappiness.” So he lives his days “with the rediscovery of love as my embers of hope”, accepting that even the deepest love is not enough if it means losing one’s connection with his very nature. This is a thinking person’s book that is infused with feelings, a tale of love, regret, passion, and ultimately, acceptanceA turning point is reached and Bjarni must make a choice: leave his home of birth with Helga and start anew or allow her to exit his life. But is a choice ever that simple? Bjarni feels another type of love – a deep pull – from the land that he feels akin to. In one striking passage, he writes, “I would have dug a ditch for you and filled it back up again, the same ditch all my life. I would have walked miles for you every single day…But to abandon myself, the countryside and farming, which were who I am; that I couldn’t do.”

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ 5.0 out of 5 stars







  
  
    Extraordinary novel.  So suprising!
  

*by L***Y on Reviewed in the United States on October 8, 2013*

This is one of those books that, if someone tells you what it is about, you probably think:  "Not for me."  But it is a story that will stay with you and is written so beautifully.  The person who is 'replying to a letter from Helga' is an old Icelandic farmer writing to a former neighbor and lover with extraordinary honesty about himself and his life.  He examines his lies to himself, the strengths of the small community he lives in, the experiences he has had and others he has missed.  I recommend this book!

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*Product available on Desertcart Cyprus*
*Store origin: CY*
*Last updated: 2026-02-27*