Just a note from the translator in reaction to the published customer review -- the "witches' rings" of the title are rings trampled in the grass by mating deer, and allude to the way people spend their lives running around in circles, unsure of what they want or how to obtain it, as the character who sees them observes that the deer are doing.

There is no disputing Kerstin Ekman's reputation as an author of note. I am happy to see Witches' Rings available in English. On the whole, I appreciate Linda Schenk's translation, although, there are times when I did wonder whether Ms. Schenk understood what it was that she was translating. (The "witches' rings" of the title are what I always understood to be "fairy rings" those circles if mushrooms one should not cross.)

This novel is set in a rural area - not even yet a town - transformed into a city by the railroad in 1870. Ekman ably captures the dizzying transformations of Swedish rural life in the 19th century. The novel at first seems awkward, and disjointed, but like a steam locomotive it gradually builds speed and momentum until at the end the "ticking clock" accelerates the final scenes. The book describes the nearly forty years of the lives of the Edla and her daughter Tora. Tora is a tough survivor who does not cry, because she is saving her tears for the time when she really needs them. When finally she does cry, we do not know whether she is crying for the dead or for herself and for those of us who survive in this modern world where the clock is always ticking.

Americans with Swedish ancestry will find this novel explains a great deal about the circumstances that brought their families to consider migration.

It's almost too easy to compare Ekman with Lagerlöf. Both have written tellingly about nineteenth century Swedish life. Certainly, this book brings into plain view what is found between the lines in Lagerlöf's writing.

Like just about all of Ekman's work, this novel takes place in the north of Sweden, but the main (and just about the only) character is a dog who, as a young puppy gets separated from it mother, littermates, and owners in the bleak wilds of norrland. It's the story of how the dog survives on his own, but this is no Bambi. The closest English-language story I can think of is The Incredible Journey, but Hunden is utterly stripped down, like Scandinavian design. Moving and beautiful, yes, but with a constant reminder of harsh reality. This is just about my favorite dog book. Plus, for a non-native Swedish speaker, it's short and not difficult to read.

Contrary to the other reviews I browsed, I did not find this book particularly exciting. And I found the ending somewhat anti-climatic.

I bought it with the hope it would be better. I told my husband not to waste his time reading it.

This is one of the few books I've ever read where when I finished the last page I turned right back to the first and started over. Lots of plot and character crammed into a slim volume. It's a thriller that's worth rereading even after you know the plot, to see what you missed along the way. Like "Blackwater," the other of Ekman's books that I've read, it's enormously evocative of the Swedish north country and a great read for that alone. Despite the uniquely Scandinavian milieu, thecharacters are universal, even if not particularly sympathetic.

A man is dead and the police are called in to investigate a small isolated Lapland community. The police have to use all their wits to sift through the information they are given from the local people and come to their conclusion. All the locals have something or someone to hide.

It is a very atmospheric novel, with the scent of the birches as glaring as the crunch of snow underfoot. Great to read snuggled up somewhere warm!

A young man and woman are brutally stabbed to death in their tent while camping in beautiful surroundings beside a river in the mountains of Sweden. Though a number of people were in the area at the time, no one has apparently seen or knows anything and the crime remains unsolved for years.

Bleak, slow moving who-done-it style mystery sent in a remote area of Sweden, this book is a compelling read because of its characters. As well as being a complex crime novel, an intricate puzzle with clues to be picked up along the way, this is also a psychological thriller exploring the depths of human depression. The theme of this story is loneliness & being the outsider - Johan is an outsider in his own family, the Starhill community is apart from the regular country people, Annie is outside the school community she teaches in, the Lapps are outside mainstream Swedish society, and Birger is the ultimate symbol of aloneness.

This was my 2nd reading of this novel and was most helpful, the novel is so disjointed with several plot lines that this time I noticed so many more clues along the way. Events take place over years, eventually the different threads come together. I really enjoyed this book but more because of the all too realistic characters & the vivid detailed descriptions of the landscape than the actual crime plot.

During a holiday in 1994 visiting Oslo and Bergen I was given a gift of "Miss Smilla's Feeling For Snow" (F. David Translation). I finished it on my flight back to San Francisco and felt the utter void experienced after reading a book that one feels shall not have any peer. Fortunately, I was wrong. It took only two years to find "Blackwater" and Kerstin Ekman. Blackwater is a novel of vast human perception blending fatalistic destiny and paganism along with basic Sherlock Holmes sleuthing all set against a sometimes desolate, but beautiful and lonely landscape that conceals a constant undercurrent of emotional arousal. An aura of mystery and suspense surrounds each and every highly descriptive locale within the novel from the initial murder site in the woods to a secret mountain hideaway along the Norwegian border to an apartment in Stockholm and many others along the way. This has to be one of the finest novels that I have ever read regardless of genre.

This is a must-read.

Blackwater is a beautifully plotted thriller. It does what all good thrillers should do: it uses the mystery of a brutal crime to explore deeper, darker mysteries.

I came to the book having read Ekman's The Forest of Hours, a novel which shares with Blackwater an obsession with time, memory and survival. Above all, Kerstin Ekman evokes the forces of nature with exquisite detail and passion. She is a writer of stature. We need more of her novels in English.

This book is about a troll from the Skule forest in Northern Sweden. He ages very slowly and lives many lifetimes among people, developing both finer and baser human qualities along the way.

At times the writing transported me to Skule and I could almost smell the decaying pine needles. Kirsten Ekman succesfully created a picture of medieval life in this harsh environment and her descriptions of animal life in the forest was like nothing I had ever read before.

However, as our troll-hero ages, the characterisations of his human companions become less sharp, the writing became less evocative and the forest somehow less magical. It seemed as if this novel was an over-ambitious project that the author just couldn't quite pull off. Reading the last few chapters, I just wanted it be over.

Still, there were enough memorable passages in the book for me to want to try Kirsten Ekman again - and soon.

The Tale of a troll with an interest in humans and their affairs, this is a quick summary of what the novel is about. But this doesn't do it justice, in a gradual movement from "somewhere" in the middle ages right up to "somewhere" in the 18th Century we follow the story of this troll as he suffers and loves, he does this in a way not unlike stories such as "The Lord of the Rings" but also engenders a feeling akin to spirituality as well. At times the world Ekman creates almost resonates with being from animal languages which are understood and yet still remain animal to the sense of presence in the wood of the title. More than anything this is brought out in the ending. The sense of what it is to be a forest or how a person can live is shown by Ekman, a characteristic not unknown in Scandinavian writers.

This is an extraordinary work. Ekman tracks the centuries-long life of a troll, from his early years in the northern Scandinavian forest through his assimilation into human society. We see the hero move through a series of incarnations (from the perspective of human life spans) as brigand, army medic, prisoner, alchemist, physician...

As one reads on, the work reveals itself to be a wonderfully insightful perspective on civilization, and on the follies and joys of human life.

Ekman evokes the human environment as it would have been experienced by those whose efforts helped shape our own more comfortable circumstances. Extreme poverty, hunger, cold and lack of even basic security eventually gives way to the comforts we take for granted, until our troll finds that he is troubled by all sorts of modern ailments, from ennui through coffee-induced stomach acidity!

Ekman obviously has a deep love of nature, and the book is at once a deep affirmation of the wonders of our environmental heritage and a mourning of what is being lost.

Great works of literature deserve great translators, and Ekman's Scottish collaborator in this instance has produced a superb result that is an absolute joy to read in English.

Highly recommended to anyone wanting a thoughtful, engaging and enjoyable read.