Reykjavík, the near-future. Society is divided by a development in social technology-a diagnostic tool called The Empathy Test that measures compassion or amorality. In less than two months, a national referendum will determine whether 'marking' each citizen with their results of the test will become compulsory. Four main characters-Vetur, Eyja, Óli and Tristan-face dilemmas of agency and autonomy while navigating their everyday desires and duties. As the dawn of irreversible changes in healthcare ethics, socioeconomic stability and the cultural fabric draws nearer, the mark of judgment lays bare the balance of their persona and political loyalties and conflicts. Polyphonic and profound, probing and perturbing, The Mark is a fresh and confident take on populism, polarization, and partisanship. Powerful, compulsively readable and radically contemporary, it asks us whether we want to live in a world defined by faith in each other, or fear of the future...

From Icelandic author Sigridur Hagalin Bjoernsdottir comes a heart-wrenching thriller about a woman's desperate quest to save the people she loves from a natural disaster. After an eight-hundred-year slumber, the volcanoes in Iceland's most populated region are showing signs of life. Earthquakes dominate the headlines. Echoes of the devastating eruptions in the past stir unease in the people. Volcanologist Anna Arnardottir has spent her entire life studying the volcanic powers under the earth's crust, but even she cannot fathom the catastrophe at hand. As a series of eruptions threaten most of Iceland's population, she's caught off her rational guard by the most terrible natural disaster of all-love. The world as she knows it is about to fall apart, and so is her heart. Caught between the safety of a nation and her feelings for her children, her lover, and her past, Anna embarks on a dangerous journey to save the lives of the people she loves-and her soul.

From Icelandic author Sigridur Hagalin Bjoernsdottir comes a heart-wrenching thriller about a woman's desperate quest to save the people she loves from a natural disaster. After an eight-hundred-year slumber, the volcanoes in Iceland's most populated region are showing signs of life. Earthquakes dominate the headlines. Echoes of the devastating eruptions in the past stir unease in the people. Volcanologist Anna Arnardottir has spent her entire life studying the volcanic powers under the earth's crust, but even she cannot fathom the catastrophe at hand. As a series of eruptions threaten most of Iceland's population, she's caught off her rational guard by the most terrible natural disaster of all-love. The world as she knows it is about to fall apart, and so is her heart. Caught between the safety of a nation and her feelings for her children, her lover, and her past, Anna embarks on a dangerous journey to save the lives of the people she loves-and her soul.

The past returns with a fury for a woman coming to terms with her life in this award-winning novel by an acclaimed Icelandic author making her English-language debut. Elin Jonsdottir lives an isolated existence in Reykjavik, Iceland, making props and prosthetics for theatrical productions and Nordic crime flicks. In her early seventies, she has recently become fascinated with another loner, Ellen Alfsdottir, a sensitive young playwright and illegitimate daughter of a famous writer. The girl has aroused maternal feelings in Elin, but she has also stirred discomfiting memories long packed away. Because their paths have crossed before. One doesn't remember. The other is about to forget. Soon they'll discover all they have in common: difficult childhoods, trauma, and being outliers who have found space to breathe in creative expression. Yet the more Elin tries to connect with the young woman and unbox painful memories, the more tenuous her grasp on reality becomes. Winner of the Icelandic Literary Prize, A Fist or a Heart is a gripping, artfully interwoven novel of power, secrets, and isolation by one of the most bracing and original voices of the author's generation.