The Other Side of the Day

Written with quiet nerve and brilliant precision, The Other Side of the Day is a poetic, critical working-class novel by debut author Emeli Bergman, who writes with both sensitivity and solidarity, and is currently nominated for the Montana Literature Prize, Politiken’s Literature Prize, and the Critic’s Choice Award.

The Other Side of the Day is about being employed by a family. About boundaries and roles that mutate and crumble. About preparing meals that you are not allowed to eat yourself. About caring for a home and for children who belong to others.

To distance herself from her own family and her little brother’s sudden death, Anna travels to Paris and takes a job as an au-pair. The relationship with her employers is at once intimate and full of distance. She connects with the children, their parents, the homes and her tasks - but just below the surface lurks cold formality and job insecurity, tension and repression, poetry and pain.

About the author 

Emeli Bergman (b. 1988), a graduate of the Danish Academy of Creative Writing, made her debut in 2017 with the short story collection Salt. Originally from Sweden, Emeli lives in Copenhagen with her son. She has previously worked as a babysitter in France and Italy and with children in Denmark. The Other Side of the Day is her first novel.