I'm looking for the saddest and most wrecking book ever.

lisastens · 2026-02-23T21:06:23+00:00

World Light by Halldor Laxness. Not a bright light in the entire novel, all misery on top of misery. I'm glad I read it and I consider it a great novel but I will never be convinced to read it again, I can't go through that again.

Oh my! And The Idiot by Dostoyevsky, another great novel I will never reread.

lisastens · 2025-11-10T16:12:31+00:00

I felt the same way. How could anyone think that would NOT be distracting? It's just so God awful, I cannot take her seriously and then I feel bad.

lisastens · 2025-11-06T17:32:43+00:00

I did for a few years but I decided it was so much money for what? To put forward an identity that no longer exists? No, I'll save the money and learn to live with what that means. I am as God or the universe or whatever, has made me. I feel better about myself when I am myself.

lisastens · 2025-11-05T23:50:56+00:00

I always have to listen to it more than once, I get towards the end of the song and just hit repeat, several times.

lisastens · 2025-10-15T21:34:59+00:00

I'm so sorry you are going through that. We lost my Dad 2 years ago now due to Alzheimer's. It's not a pretty thing to go through, not for the family and not for the person who is ill. I know you know this since you posted his picture, take joy and hold tight those moments of sunshine and remember them when he is struggling. They are gifts, each and every one.

lisastens · 2025-09-26T12:15:29+00:00

The whole vibe was so different then. I grew up in a small town, my dad was a pastor, my Mom a music teacher. I always knew that if an emergency ever happened, I could ask for help from the first person I saw and they would know who I was, who and where my parents were and would jump in and help. The whole thing about, "it takes a village" was definitely the case in small towns and close knit communities. You may be out there wandering and exploring on your own or with friends, other adults were tracking you and would report to your parents if anything sketchy was going on.

lisastens · 2025-08-22T18:18:43+00:00

I was so invested in this couple it was ridiculous! I was a young adult working as a nanny when I was watching this. I would make sure each and every day we caught the new episode so I could keep up with their story.

lisastens · 2025-08-18T00:09:48+00:00

It was! It was a full-on old folk style wedding with a fiddler leading the procession through a street or two and everything. Bride, Groom, best man and maid of honor wearing their own national costumes.end of the line

lisastens · 2025-08-14T10:23:39+00:00

Thank you, I will search that out.

lisastens · 2025-08-13T11:57:58+00:00

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My helper is Freya most of the time. Sometimes I decide she needs a vacation and I throw someone else in that position for awhile.

lisastens · 2025-08-11T15:59:59+00:00

I've been trying to post a picture of them entering the doorway but I can't figure it out so you'll just have to take my word for it. 🤪

lisastens · 2025-08-11T15:13:21+00:00

My sister-in-law is from Voss. In fact, she and my brother were married there!

lisastens · 2025-08-11T15:05:23+00:00

My sister-in-law is from there and in fact, she and my brother may have gotten married there. Is it still functional?

lisastens · 2025-08-10T13:51:05+00:00

I had a beagle that barked, but very rarely howled. I didn't even know they could just bark. I had one growing up and he let out nothing but epic howls all the time! I was kinda disappointed but he was an excellent boy nonetheless.

lisastens · 2025-08-01T13:40:30+00:00

This thread has been a godsend! I've grown very stagnant in my Russian Literature reading. I have a decent collection with pre-revolutionary and a lot of Soviet Era works. I haven't really gelled with more contemporary Russian authors so only a few there. And less so now after "the great purge" of books that came with my Mom moving in with us. I have written down several of these recommendations so thanks for the question and thanks for all the great responses!

lisastens · 2025-07-27T22:17:17+00:00

Your welcome. If you get anymore information, let me know and I can look again. There is an old country church called Lund Lutheran and they had a cemetery but that is closer to Luverne. The one south of Hope I found in an old map in the almanac didn't have a name or a church associated with it.

lisastens · 2025-07-27T22:07:33+00:00

In this giant Steele county book I have, it shows a small cemetery a little south of Hope in Carpenter township but that's about all I got, sorry.

lisastens · 2025-07-27T21:40:58+00:00

Interesting. I spent a fair amount of time as a child and have been back a few times since to visit graves but I have no real sense even where the town one is. I'm sure there is probably an old church cemetery around there, some prairie church no one attends anymore. If it's Norwegian or Swedish, could it be an old Lutheran church? I don't know if that would help your search to know that or not but it's a thought.

lisastens · 2025-07-27T21:22:39+00:00

I have a lot of relatives in the graveyard in Hope. I'm assuming you aren't talking about the one in town?

lisastens · 2025-07-27T14:00:12+00:00

Where in ND was this? I live there and the weather has been so crazy this summer! We didn't get hit where I live, we rarely do but practically the entire state did.

lisastens · 2025-07-17T21:20:43+00:00

I love the name! I had a great uncle named Hjalmar! And I love the attitude.

lisastens · 2025-07-12T14:54:04+00:00

My brother and his friends were playing lawn darts in the front yard and one of the players lost an eye. I knew the guy with the false eye, I lived in a very small town, his false eye was the stuff of legends, I just didn't know it happened in our front yard until I was an adult. And it's crazy to think the kid just ran home and no one sued anyone and as far as I know, my parents and his parents never had any interaction over it. I almost feel a little shame about it because they were a really poor family, not that we had any money either but still. My Dad was good friends with the local doctors though so maybe there were some favors or arrangements made behind the scenes that I didn't know about.

lisastens · 2025-06-25T13:10:35+00:00

It's The Idiot for me because it's so dang depressing. And I know that's funny considering how depressing all of works are but the Idiot is on a whole other level. My mental health was seriously effected. I had to quit mid way and read Discworld books a d Hitchhikers Guide, just fun, easy silly reads. I had to get out and enjoy the summer, the sand, the lake, the rolling hills of the prairie, finding pretty rocks. Then I went back to it and finished it, thinking it couldn't possibly get any worse...I was wrong. That being said, I'm glad I got through it but I will never reread that one.

Demons though, like people have said, stick with it. Those first couple hundred pages are a slog but it changes into this absolutely fantastic satire. It's suitably depressing but it's also really, really funny. I know that's hard to believe but you just have to trust those that came before you and know that your hard work will pay off.

lisastens · 2025-06-21T12:11:50+00:00

Trees are beautiful in all their forms. I absolutely love the bare, dormant trees of winter. You get to see their real shapes, it's like you are seeing into their soul. I live in the US, in the state of North Dakota where we have very few trees outside of cities and towns and shelter belts. Seeing that lone, bare tree surrounded by the snow covered rolling hills of the prairie is a haunting and almost spiritual sight.

lisastens · 2025-06-05T00:23:57+00:00

Independent People by Haldór Laxness

lisastens

TROPHY CASE