When the Cranes Fly South

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When the Cranes Fly South

By: Lisa Ridzén, Alice Menzies - translator

Narrated by: Ifan Huw Dafydd

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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

Shortlisted for the Waterstones Debut Fiction Prize 2025

The most moving book of the year about the power of human connection. A book to love, and share.

Bo lives a quiet existence in his small rural village in the north of Sweden. He is elderly and his days are punctuated by visits from his care team and his son.

Fortunately, he still has his rich memories, phone calls with his best friend Ture, and his beloved dog Sixten for company.

Only now his son is insisting the dog must be taken away. The very same son that Bo is wanting to mend his relationship with before his time is up. The threat of losing Sixten stirs up a whirlwind of emotions and makes Bo determined to resist and find his voice.

An instant number one bestseller in Sweden and winner of the Swedish Book of the Year, When the Cranes Fly South is a profoundly moving and life-affirming novel about one man’s desire to preserve his autonomy, the multitude of stories contained within a life, and the big things for which we have no words.

'The kind of book you give to someone when you’re really trying to say “I’ve been thinking about you” but don’t know how.' Fredrik Backman, bestselling author of A Man Called Ove

'A magical reading experience; among the most moving things I’ve ever read' No.1 internationally bestselling author Camilla Läckberg

'A book that will echo in your soul' Garth Stein, bestselling author of The Art of Racing in the Rain

NUMBER ONE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER
WINNER OF THE SWEDISH BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD

© Lisa Ridzén 2024 (P) Penguin Audio 2025

Dark Humour

Family Life

Genre Fiction

Literary Fiction

Literature & Fiction

World Literature

Village

Heartfelt

Tear-jerking

Inspiring

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Critic reviews

The most moving book I’ve ever read – heart-breaking but also heart-warming.

A novel anyone will take to heart. A simple yet effective meditation on mortality, love and care... Lisa Ridzén’s debut demonstrates how sometimes the simplest storytelling can be the most effective. Anyone anywhere who has worried for a crumbling parent, or worried about the crumble in themselves, or simply worried that their dog understood them better than their family, will identify with Ridzén’s novel.

A tender tale about ageing, our own and others, and the quiet brutality of love. About what being a man is, and what being a human is, about fathers and sons and fathers and dogs. It’s really a book for anyone who’s had to say goodbye. The kind of book you give to someone when you’re really trying to say “I’ve been thinking about you” but don’t know how.

This empathetic Swedish bestseller is a poignant, quietly devastating meditation on old age.

This profoundly moving novel is sure to melt you into tears faster than a Cornetto in the sunshine ... Poignant, beautifully written and guaranteed to spark introspection.

Through lucid, observant writing, Ridzén conveys the lack of autonomy allowed to elderly people in a heartfelt novel that gives voice to a sensitively realised old man.

Meditations on memory and fatherhood underpin this tender tale about a man defending his right to live independently.

It’s one of those “you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll want to buy twenty copies and give them to everyone you love” books.

There are not many novels that I want to tell you that you should read, but this is one of them. It is a novel about family, how our history shapes our present, and the many different forms that love can take. This is a beautiful and gentle novel about an honest and relatable man who simply wants to live quietly with his dog, and I won’t ever forget it.

Once you’ve read this beautiful and deeply emotional story, you’ll want to pass it on to someone you love.

Most relevant

I enjoyed this book about the final months of Bo's life , his reflections on life and death, his memories,friendships,family & regrets, there are some lessons there !