The Ferryman and His Wife - by Frode Grytten (Paperback)

About the Book

"Nils Vik wakes up on November the 18th and knows it will be the day he dies. He follows his morning routine as voices from his past echo in his mind, and looks around the empty house one last time, before stepping onto his beloved boat. His dog, dead these many years, leaps aboard with him, and then the other dead begin to emerge--from the woods along the fjord, from each of the ferry stops along the route, from his logbook full of memories and quotations and jotted-down notes about the weather conditions. The people from the past accompany him now, prodding him, showing him what he might have missed before, as he waits for his Marta, his late, remarkable wife, to finally join him on the boat again"--

Book Synopsis

A LIBRARY READS PICK AND ONE OF NPR'S BEST BOOKS OF 2025

For everyone who loved The Correspondent and When the Cranes Fly South, the renowned, bestselling Norwegian author Frode Grytten takes readers on a quietly epic journey: ferry driver Nils Vik's last route along the fjord, on what he knows will be his last day alive.

Nils Vik wakes up on November the 18th and knows it will be the day he dies. He follows his morning routine as voices from his past echo in his mind, and looks around the empty house one last time, before stepping onto his beloved boat.

His dog, dead these many years, leaps aboard with him, and then the other dead begin to emerge - from the woods along the fjord, from each of the ferry stops along the route, from his logbook full of memories and quotations and jotted-down notes about the weather conditions. The people from the past accompany him now, prodding him, showing him what he might have missed before, as he waits for his Marta, his late, remarkable wife, to finally join him on the boat again.

Winner of the prestigious Brage Prize, and considered to be Grytten's long-awaited masterpiece, The Ferryman and His Wife is the story of a quiet, yet utterly profound, life told in reverse. Timeless and absorbing, this is a novel about what we take with us - those moments that might seem insignificant as they happen but prove to be the most meaningful, in the end.

Review Quotes

"[A] short, quiet treasure...It's a beautiful tribute to the power of kindness.--Heller McAlpin, NPR's Best Books of 2025

The Ferryman and His Wife is an ode to the necessary frictions of community, love, and relationships, from the fleeting to the most intimate... On the surface, Grytten's work is not dissimilar to that of Jon Fosse, his Nobel Prize-winning compatriot... Grytten's stands apart for its unexpected warmth and specificity, its deep care for the minutiae of everyday life."--Foreign Policy

"Every now and then, one encounters what feels like a perfect little novel: a beautifully written, compelling distillation of love and life... This slight Norwegian novel is unforgettable and surprising, packed with remarkable characterizations and superbly translated into English by Alison McCullough... Its often-subtle stories are both beautiful and brutal... In exquisitely crafted chapters, The Ferryman and His Wife encapsulates a vanishing lifestyle and life."--BookPage

"A short, unexpectedly uplifting book about the end of an outwardly ordinary life...a beautifully wrought, unsentimental novel of time and memory."--Irish Times

"Beautifully written and thought-provoking, this stayed with me for a long time."--Daily Mail

"Each page is made marvelous by rocks and avalanches and little cabins, the silvery moon overhead...things begin to sparkle with a magical realism of the Gabriel García Márquez kind.... It's these sweeping questions of life and death that are at the heart of this offbeat book, but rather than great scary things as they appear in gloomy Greek mythology - Grytten presents them as contemplations that...almost make it something to look forward to, like a long breath out at the end of a hard day."--The Times (UK)

"This quiet, contemplative novel [is] a beautiful look at the end of a life, and Nils calls to mind the mythological ferrymen who carry dead souls to the underworld."--Town & Country

"The Ferryman and His Wife is one of those rare novels that takes us beyond reading about a character's life to experiencing that life. Grytten is an immensely talented writer, and as Nils, the book's central character, makes his final voyage we also relive with him his losses and heartbreaks, his blessings and joys, all of which gather to a profound affirmation of life. Mystical, yet true to the depths of the human heart, Grytten's novel is a triumph."
--Ron Rash, author of Serena and The Caretaker

"The devastating English-language debut from Grytten...turns out to be a Dante-esque voyage...Grytten skillfully weaves his wistful protagonist's life story without ever leaning on sentimentality. This will linger long in readers' minds."--Publishers Weekly

"Few novels understand so well that a life can never be summed up and will always overflow its telling. Everything is at stake in these166 pages, saturated with tenderness, achingly real and profoundly moving."--Anne Michaels, author of Held and Fugitive Pieces

"A heartfelt reckoning of a human life, with all that it entails. With a grounded, everyday touch, Grytten patiently weaves the slow tapestry of how a human being comes into being-through their relationships, not only with other people, but with the place itself and the lives that inhabit it." --Lisa Ridzén, internationally bestselling author of When the Cranes Fly South

"A poignant, lyrical novel about the power of the individual to shape their world, no matter how small, no matter how insular. Its beauty lies in the fluent and moving harmony of many voices in celebrating this one life...I found it terribly moving and a constant surprise." --Roisin Maguire, author of Night Swimmers

"Only a few pages into The Ferryman and His Wife, I was heartbroken that this story would ever end. With his spare, beautiful prose, Frode Grytten made me homesick for a landscape I've never seen--the remote and wintry fjords of Norway. Gorgeous and devastating in its simplicity, The Ferryman and His Wife takes us to the heart of things--life and how we live it but also how we leave it."--Eileen Garvin, bestselling author of Crow Talk and The Music of Bees.

"The character of Nils conveys patience, wisdom, kindness, and love in a narrative that inevitably brings to mind the Greek myth of Charon, ferrying dead souls across the Rivers of Acheron and Styx to Hades... Against the harsh and beautiful Norwegian landscape backdrop, [Grytten] reveals the depth and complexity of ordinary lives in this outstanding novel, without even the briefest descent into sentimentality."--Library Journal, *STARRED REVIEW*

"Tenderly powerful and urgently contemplative, The Ferryman and His Wife is a profound exploration of what gives a life meaning. With remarkable creativity and piercing honesty, Frode Grytten guides us on a vivid and intimate journey through both the ferryman's fjord, and his memories. The story is breathtaking, unforgettable, and threaded with humble insights about the human experience. Upon turning the final page, I held the book to my chest with a shiver of gratitude."
--Sarah Damoff, USA Today-bestselling author of The Bright Years

About the Author

Frode Grytten had his big breakthrough in 1999 with the Brage Prize-winning novel Beehive Song. He is known throughout Norway for his short stories, but has returned to the novel form after over a decade with The Ferryman and His Wife, which was also awarded the Brage Prize, Norway's most important literary award, and his first book to be translated widely around the world. 

Alison McCullough is a Norwegian-to-English translator and writer. Her recent translations include The Widow by Helene Flood, Reptile Memoirs by Silje Ulstein and Lean Your Loneliness Slowly Against Mine by Klara Hveberg, which was longlisted for the PEN Translation Prize 2022. Originally from a small mining community in the north of England, she now lives in Stavanger, Norway.