NORTH OF THE WINTER SUN

A young woman’s search for freedom, nature and community on a wooden sailboat far from home.

‘I sail out of the fjord, out towards the ocean, where there is air and I can breathe and I breathe. I breathe.’

In her early twenties, Veronica Skotnes left everything behind to live alone on an old wooden sailboat, in search of the peace that can only be found in nature. Now, still chasing a longing she cannot name, she heads towards the remote coast of Finnmark, in the far north of Norway.

As she charts her course across the wild seas, her cherished solitude begins to feel more like dangerous isolation. But in Finnmark’s once-prosperous fishing villages Veronica finds community. Strangers, striving to survive, who love the ocean as much as she does. Bolstered by their warmth and generosity, she can once more set sail.

‘Completely out of the ordinary.’ Norsk Fyrforenin

Veronica Skotnes was born in Norway in 1998. Drawn towards the ocean, she began her journey in the North Sea five years ago. Since then, winds and currents have brought her north of the Arctic Circle, where she mans her own sailboat. For the past five years, she has sailed and lived on this boat along the coast of Finnmark. Skotnes shares her experiences at sea with 150,000 followers on social media. North of the Winter Sun: What I Heard in the Waves is her debut publication. She is currently living in a remote lighthouse while working on her second book.

Diane Oatley is an award-winning writer and literary translator of Norwegian fiction and non-fiction. She has translated numerous titles, including The History of Bees by Maja Lunde and The Weather Changed, Summer Came, and so on by Pedro Carmona-Alvarez, both of which were long-listed for the DUBLIN Literary Awards. In 2015, she received NORLA's (Norwegian Literature Abroad) Translator's Award for Non-Fiction.