101 Reykjavík

Hlynur Björn, a thirtyish layabout who still lives with his mother, drifts through the bars, screens and hangovers of downtown Reykjavík, his aimless world upended when his mother's lover moves in. Helgason maps the real 101 postal district that gives the book its name: the flat in the old centre, the shopping and bar street of Laugavegur, the downtown pubs of the weekend rúntur, and the little lake of Tjörnin at the city's heart.

Hlynur

The flat (101)

Chapter 1

From the sofa of his mother's flat, thirty and going nowhere, Hlynur narrates his life of television, internet porn, unemployment cheques and hangovers in a stream of bleak, deadpan wit. The cramped central flat, and his refusal to leave it or grow up, is the still centre from which his aimless downtown world radiates.

Chapter 1

inferred Hlynur lives with his mother in a flat in the 101 postal district, the old central quarter of Reykjavík that gives the book its title; the flat is invented and sited in that real neighbourhood.

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