\nA semi-autobiographical novel about a childhood with no mother and a “crazy” father. (Autobiographically inspired novels about difficult childhoods seem to occupy about a quarter of the shelf space in Swedish bookshops nowadays – half is filled with detective stories and a quarter is left over for other odds and ends.)\n<\/p>\n
\nConnie grows up with her aunt and uncle, who take care of her out of duty and with not much love. The rest of the people in her life are not much different. She finds them boring and intolerant, and no one understands her. She has trouble at school (difficulty sitting still and concentrating, and often she falls asleep) and only one friend.\n<\/p>\n
\nAll this bleak dullness around her makes it all the more understandable that she loves her father Ted – because he is fun. Ted enjoys defying all social conventions and expectations, telling tall stories and making mischief. He steals garden gnomes from his neighbour’s garden, takes Connie to a porn movie, and sneaks them into a circus tent by crawling under its edge. Connie looks up to him, and takes after him: she hides a forbidden hamster in her room, rides without a ticket on her weekend trips to her dad, and leaves turds in front of neighbours’ doors.\n<\/p>\n
\nConnie spends every other weekend with her father. Or rather, she is supposed to, but sometimes her father forgets. The more you read, the more you realise that Ted confuses unconventionality with selfishness: what he likes to think of as his rebellion isn’t anything high-minded like an effort to change the world or to show people what is possible, but simple disregard for others’ lives. Connie herself sees this only after many years of disappointment.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe story initially seems fun, but is sad inside: the almost infinite love and loyalty of a child is ignored by her father, and no one else in her life cares much for her, either. She is seen as trouble, and perhaps pitied. Today (or perhaps even in the 1970s, if she had caring parents?) she would probably be diagnosed with some kind of letter combination and get help at school. Or maybe not. And even with that help she would still not fit in anywhere in a conservative small town.\n<\/p>\n
\nAs semi-autobiographies go, this one wasn’t too bad, but not too good either. Connie was well written, but Ted’s character doesn’t quite work. He’s described as a womanizer, always introducing Connie to new girlfriends, but he comes across as ridiculous rather than charismatic, and it’s hard to understand how he’d attract all those women. A greater weakness is the book’s repetitive nature. Not much changes or develops over time, and it all becomes an endless list of Ted’s escapades. No matter how wild they all are, it becomes boring after a while.\n<\/p>\n