Books from Denmark

Five university friends reunite for seven summer days at a lakeside house in the Danish countryside, hoping to recapture the freedom and intimacy of their younger years. Sylvia, who has always dreamed of a more unconventional way of living, finds herself increasingly disillusioned as her friends arrive with careers, children, and established relationships. The situation becomes even more complicated when Esben, the object of Sylvia’s long-standing crush, announces that he intends to marry Karen at the end of the week. Meanwhile, Sylvia’s relationship with her girlfriend, Charlie, forces her to confront the tension between romantic commitment and her desire for something less conventional. As the friends swim, drink, flirt, and argue beneath the midsummer sky, old attractions resurface and carefully maintained boundaries begin to dissolve. Through their conversations and intimate encounters, Linea Maja Ernst explores the contradictions of adulthood, the changing nature of friendship, and the difficulty of reconciling youthful ideals with the realities of everyday life. Sensual, witty, and emotionally perceptive, Waist Deep asks whether growing up necessarily means abandoning the freedom to imagine a different kind of life.