UpLit / Literature and Fiction · Hardback

In the House of Pantaloon

Norwegian title: I Pantalones hus

Hilde Rød-Larsen

In The House of Pantaloon is a novel about the destructive power of shame and how the silence that follows in its wake can ripple through generations.

The novel is set in Oslo, over the course of a few months. We follow Eva and Cornelia in alternate chapters, as Eva is dealing with widowhood, and Cornelia with a broken relationship and single parenthood. Through chance, Eva and Cornelia’s paths keep crossing. A tender and unexpected affinity develops between the two women, who at first seem to have little in common, and who find themselves in vastly different circumstances.

The story has a plot-driven narrative, with an existential nerve, slight satirical elements, and much warmth. By the end, the reader will realize how these two women‘s lives are intertwined through secrets of the past and “the sins of the fathers”, with Henrik Ibsen‘s Ghosts as a hinted-at backdrop.

Riveting about power«The community, the warmth and the compassion make Hilde Rød-Larsen’s novel a terrific example of a feminine writing in a traditionally male-dominated world.»KLASSEKAMPEN«A character-driven drama which engages and entertains. […] Rød-Larsen has a good grip on the text with dialogue that flows well.»ADRESSEAVISA, five/six stars

«It requires courage to do what Hilde Rød-Larsen does in her new novel, In The House of Pantaloon, where she delves deep into the old patriarchy's oppression of women and the logic of abuse in a literary form, which shamelessly mimics the narrative ridiculousness, which we know from Hallmark's feelgood Christmas films. Can it actually work? Yes, it can.»WEEKENDAVISEN (Denmark)

«Although a larger drama lurks underneath, the novel spends a while focusing on portraying its two protagonists, making them flesh and blood people and placing them in their time. It works exceedingly well. Hilde Rød-Larsen's prose flows beautifully and unpretentiously, she portrays her characters sincerely and honestly as they move through the evasive everyday life ... In a seamless and touching manner, she switched between her two main characters, and slowly but surely she lets her story pick up the pace in the second half, all the way to the quite brilliant ending, which of course will not be revealed here. Only that the book's plot and thinking are expressed in a form that is both appropriate and unexpected.»INFORMATION (Denmark)

«A grand story told in few pages!»SØNDAG (Denmark)