Strega

A Novel

By: Johanne Lykke Holm

Narrated by: Kristen Sieh, Saskia Vogel -translator

“Strega left me breathless, angry, and then thrilled by the dare it leaves in the reader's lap.”—Lidia Yuknavitch, author of Thrust and The Chronology of Water

Powerfully inventive and atmospheric, a modern gothic story of nine young women sent to work at a remote Alpine hotel and what happens when one of them goes missing

With toiletries, hairbands, and notebooks in her bag, and at her mother’s instruction, a nineteen-year-old girl leaves her parents’ home and the seaside town she grew up in. Out the train window, Rafa sees the lit-up mountains and perfect trees—and the Olympic Hotel waiting for her perched above the small village of Strega. There, she and eight other girls receive the stiff black uniforms of seasonal workers and move into their shared dorm. But while they toil constantly to perform their role and prepare the hotel for guests, none arrive. Instead, they contort themselves daily to the expectations of their strict, matronly bosses without clear purpose and, in their spare moments, escape to the herb garden, confide in each other, and quickly find solace together. Finally, the hotel is filled with people for a wild and raucous party, only for one of the girls to disappear. What follows are deeper revelations about the myths we teach young women, what we raise them to expect from the world, and whether a gentler, more beautiful life is possible.

In stimulating and uninhibited imagery, Johanne Lykke Holm builds a world laced with the supernatural, filled with the secrecy and potential energy of girls on the cusp of womanhood. An allegory for the societal rites, expectations of women, and violence we too easily allow, Strega builds like a spell that keeps exerting its powers long after listening.

©2022 Johanne Lykke Holm (P)2022 Penguin Audio

Critic reviews

“A novel that consumes, that interrupts its reader’s present. . . . Holm’s world is one of richness, of allegory, where blood and milk and mold are common, recurring substances, and color is used generously like an impasto painting. . . . the novel’s commentary on patriarchal violence lands thoughtfully on the world historical map. . . . when you close Strega, you continue to feel its presence.” —Los Angeles Review of Books

“Transfixing. . . . A thought-provoking fairy tale for our flawed patriarchal world. . . . Vogel's propulsive, incantatory translation is driven by hypnotic anaphora and punctuated by innumerable poetic gems. . . . [A] bravura spell.”—Star Tribune

“A sensuous tale. . . . Holm conjures a world of heady scents that is both supernatural and hyper-real. . . . [and] delivers a book that whispers a dark truth felt by many women.”—The Spectator

I couldn’t finish this book

I couldn’t get past five chapters. The prose is mediocre at best. From the beginning the narrator is expecting something bad to happen, but not in a foreboding way — in a predictable eye rolling B movie way.

Great narrator, fever dream story

Read this book if you like lyrical, flowery language. This book will make you feel as if you’re in a dram state, in the best way possible.

For good and bad, poetry.

The writing is poetry, but for me this book should have just been a (much shorter) poem. Without "spoiling" anything, even the climax was anti-climactic. I never really felt a sense of urgency at all. I can see that the author was possibly intentionally creating a sense of boredome - of the rote nature of life for so many women around the world - but it went too far for me.

It may have just been the wrong book at the wrong time for me. I tend to read for entertainment and escape and this seems to have required a lot more attention and study.

Mesmerizing

Beautiful, mystical, deeply disturbing, and right on the nose! I couldn't put it down and finished it in a single day! There is so much more to this than just the story!