The Room

Praise

“Swedish actor and playwright Karlsson’s short novel offers a monologue that builds from simple office satire to a reality-bending psychological profile with insights into the nature and importance of personal space.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Trendy Nordic noir meets faded office bureaucracy—with haunting effect.”—New York Post

“The Room, a modern, Bartleby-like examination of the tyranny of radical individualism, does mess with one’s head, but in a most pleasurable way.”—BookPage    

“Karlsson’s prose and the inventiveness of Björn’s surreal mental workings are often funny, but the overall impact is also deeply thought-provoking and profoundly disquieting, and the combination of the banal and the absurd results in a striking and singular read.” —Shelf Awareness

“The Room is the most effective chapbook on workplace comportment since Glengarry Glen Ross. Hats off!” —Nick Offerman, author of Paddle Your Own Canoe
 
“A gripping, tense, demonic fable in which the unease is precision-tooled and the turns of the screw wholly unexpected.” —Neel Mukherjee, author of The Lives of Others

“The daily grind got you down? Escape into this Swedish dark comedy about a scaldingly contemptuous office drone who discovers a secret room in his workplace.” —O: the Oprah Magazine, Ten Titles to Pick Up Now

“A contemporary tale worthy of comparison to Franz Kafka’s works, Amélie Nothomb’s Fear and Trembling, and Herman Melville’s classic ‘Bartelby, the Scrivener,’ while the antics of Björn’s fellow workers recall Terry Gilliam’s film Brazil. Enjoyable reading, extremely well executed, this fable should become mandatory reading for cubicle and office workers everywhere.” —Library Journal (starred)
 
“Surreal, funny and unsettling.” —The Independent
 
“Thoroughly enjoyable.” —Guardian
 
“Hilarious and chilling.” —Times of London
 
“Part psychological drama documenting a disturbed man’s possible descent into madness and part satirical take on corporate culture and the alienated workers it produces, Karlsson succeeds admirably in creating the perfect combination of funny, surreal, and disturbing.” —Booklist
 
“Provocative…Karlsson’s deft jab at dead-end workplaces keeps you agreeably off-balance and eager for more of his work.” —Kirkus

“Brilliant.” —Financial Times (UK)
 
“A flawless novel that you will finish with a smile.” —Knack (Netherlands)

“Jonas Karlsson masterfully tells us about his main character’s Kafkaesque adventure.”
—Panorama (Italy)
 
“A Beckettian drama in an open plan office.” —Il Giornale (Italy)
 
“Sweden has its own Kafka in Jonas Karlsson.” —DeMorgen (Netherlands)
 
“Fascinating.… Every time you think you know where Bjorn is heading, he does or says something that tilts the whole story. Minimalism and surrealism, bundled in a short but powerful novel.” —DeZondag (Netherlands)
 
“The Room has the qualities of a masterpiece.” —Göteborgsposten (Sweden)