In this experimental memoir / fiction format a girl tells her story of growing up, becoming an adult and the relationship with her charismatic father and volatile mother. The novel and her story make more sense when you realise the author is the daughter if Ingmar Bergman and Liv Ullman. Ullman beautifully documents what it was like to grow up with two artists, seeking a place to belong and those memories blending with the pain of love and loss. Her beautiful and creative language shine through every sentence. This is for the reader who loves intelligently told stories. Enjoy it.

Like nothing else I’ve read, Unquiet is a reflective, contemplative examination of the impact of parents and the repercussions of the choices they make, both big and small. Based on the author’s own life growing up with an actor mother (Liv Ullmann) and a film director father (Ingmar Bergman), Unquiet is an evocative exploration of place, people, and upbringing. Confronted by her father’s aging on the Swedish island of her childhood summers, the unnamed protagonist reflects on her childhood – divided between her mother year-round and her father in the summers. What follows is a mediation on families, ageing, and what makes you who you are. The writing is clean, yet evocative, the story forming in vignettes that shift in time and space yet remain emotionally vibrant throughout.