My Grandmother Sends Her Regards and Apologises: From the bestselling author of A MAN CALLED OVE

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Among Elsa's neighbours are eccentric chatterboxes and drunken workaholics, weird hounds and mysterious lurkers. Her mother is her punch-bag over teen issues (if Elsa can be called a teen that is) and her Dad is her word collector who can stand everything except a grammatically incorrect sentence. Well, mostly. She shouldn't take any notice of what those muppets think, says Granny. Because all the best people are different - look at superheroes."

At the centre of this book, is an almost-eight-years old, Elsa. When her best (and quirky) friend, her grandmother, leaves her a series of letters upon her death to be delivered to their intended receivers, she sets onto a thrilling journey of discoveries. What was the primary purpose of the letters you ask? You guessed it. To say sorry. The Kingdom of Miamas I swear sounded to me like Myalis, which sounds like a prescription drug for erectile dysfunction in my non-fantasy world. The animal which I guess was just a big dog but never called a dog sounded like it was called a Worse or Worser (reminding me of Wrong and Wronger ala Alec Baldwin). After digging around some, I find it was Wurse and Wurses, but I don't think that's an actual word. This dog/Wurse was constantly being fed chocolate, which is actually quite dangerous for our furry friends and should not be encouraged. Very dangerous. Little Elsa, 7 going on 8, was more like 7 going on 17. Much too smart and worldly for 7 going on 8, no matter how much she used Wikipedia. Several major themes are touched upon, including: it’s okay to be different; first impressions aren’t always accurate; your elders can teach you a lot; not all dreams should be discounted; young children often have the same fears and insecurities as adults; direct communication and understanding are vital; family does not have to share bloodlines.My Grandmother Sends Her Regards And Apologises is a step above A Man Called Ove in literary terms, fusing stark Swedish realism with childhood imagination and fairy tales. While I didn’t find Elsa quite as endearing a main character as darling old Ove, she still provided a humourous and poignant insight into what might otherwise have been a very dark story.

After my dad died -when I was 4yrs old- (her son, Max, was only 34), ...she and I became exceptionally close. She died when I was 7. I may have only had those 3 special years with Granda Cookie.. but they were some of my best childhood memories.

Elsa is seven years old and different. Her grandmother is seventy-seven years old and crazy—as in standing-on-the-balcony-firing-paintball-guns-at-strangers crazy. She is also Elsa’s best, and only, friend. At night Elsa takes refuge in her grandmother’s stories, in the Land-of-Almost-Awake and the Kingdom of Miamas, where everybody is different and nobody needs to be normal. But overall this is a story of family and its complexities and mysteries, the regrets and mistakes, and triumphs and sacrifices made over the course of a lifetime, atonement, understanding, forgiveness, and embracing individuality. If you loved Ove, you might love shrewd, intelligent, wise, cranky, funny as hell Grandma too. You will recognize the humor and daring thoughts at play.

I get what it was going for. And it’s admirable. It’s supposed to be all imagination-y, and isn’t-childhood-cool, and family is important and let’s all love each other and smile. The issues at heart are family bonds, Family history, reflections of the past, life lessons, love, forgiveness, acceptance, laughter. Just before Granny dies she presses an envelope into Elsa's hand, and asks her granddaughter to deliver a letter. The novel suffers from a slow start. There is a fairy tale device that is interweaved into the narrative that never fully grabbed me, and it took me most of the book to buy into it. Other readers I know jumped right into that aspect of the text. To each his own, right? However, the last half of the book I thought was strong narratively, things started to fall into place for me with the fairy tale device, and from that point on I was fully in.Description: Elsa is seven years old and different. Her grandmother is seventy-seven years old and crazy. Standing-on-the-balcony-firing-paintball-guns-at-men-who-want-to-talk-about-Jesus-crazy. She is also Elsa's best, and only, friend. At night Elsa runs to her grandmother's stories, to the Land of Almost-Awake and the Kingdom of Miamas. There, everybody is different and nobody needs to be normal. Heartbreaking and hilarious in equal measure, this novel will charm and delight anyone who has ever had a grandmother. Breaking into a zoo in the middle of the night? Firing a paintball gun from a balcony in her dressing gown? This was a tough one to bear after loving Ove sooooo much. Sure, I liked Elsa well enough, 7 going on 8, and Granny was pretty amazing, but the constant reverting to fairytale land made this such a disappointment for me, I was ready to ditch it several times. There was a story to be told but with too many distractions; too many things to NOT like along the way. On the audio, read with a nice British accent, I couldn't be sure of any spellings (or obviously of my hearing); so please bear with me here while I complain. And upfront I tell you who loved this book that I am sorry. Because I did not.