The Ferryman and His Wife

For me December is always a month of reflection, making it the perfect time to read The Ferryman and His Wife by Frode Grytten. The English edition came out last month; it was translated from Norwegian by Alison McCullough. This short book follows Nils on the last day of his life. As he boards his ferry for the final time, Nils reflects on all the people and memories that have impacted him over his decades as a ferryman, husband, and father. What ghosts will greet him on this final voyage?

What I Liked:

Trip down memory lane. As Nils embarks on one last, solitary voyage, he’s accompanied by the many ghosts of his past. He goes from one landmark to the next, recalling events and people from all his years as a ferryman (1948 through at least the 1990s). He has excellent memory, but he also was committed to writing down notes in his travel log, including details about passengers, the weather, and more. As Nils’s life comes to a close, these are the moments that stand out, that made him who he is now.
How Nils impacted people around him. His job was to transport passengers from one stop to the next, and in his quiet way, Nils was a part of so many life events. Births, marriages, and even deaths; saving a teenager from abuse; refusing to help a woman take her own life. Ultimately, Nils witnessed a lot and affected the lives of those in his community. This is reflected in the tear-wrenching eulogies for him towards the end of the book, too.
Ups and downs in his own marriage. Nils and his wife, Marta, had their good times and bad times throughout their decades together. She was a force of nature, and seemingly his complete opposite. She passed away first, and Nils hopes to be reunited with her in his afterlife.
Slightly magical realism. This book isn’t outright supernatural… but the way Nils reflects on his life is like he’s truly talking to ghosts. Interpret it how you will, but for me I liked the touch of magical realism.

Final Thoughts

The Ferryman and His Wife is a quiet but impactful novella, and one of my favorite reads this year. Nils may have led a simple life, but he left far-reaching ripples in his community. I loved getting to see all the moments that coalesced into a full, vivid picture of this kind-hearted man.

Special thanks to Algonquin Books and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book!

Get the Book

You can buy The Ferryman and His Wife here – it’s available as a paperback, ebook, and audiobook.

The Ferryman and His Wife by Frode Grytten
Translator	Alison McCullough
Audience	Adult
Genre	Literary Fiction
Setting	Norway
Number of Pages	176
Format I Read	Audiobook & Ebook (NetGalley ARC)
Original Publication Date	November 18, 2025
Publisher	Algonquin Books

Official Summary

A LIBRARY READS PICK AND ONE OF NPR’S BEST BOOKS OF 2025

In the spirit of Amor Towles and George Saunders, the renowned, bestselling Norwegian author Frode Grytten takes readers on a quietly epic journey: ferry driver Nils Vik’s last route along the fjord, on what he knows will be his last day alive.

Nils Vik wakes up on November the 18th and knows it will be the day he dies. He follows his morning routine as voices from his past echo in his mind, and looks around the empty house one last time, before stepping onto his beloved boat.

His dog, dead these many years, leaps aboard with him, and then the other dead begin to emerge – from the woods along the fjord, from each of the ferry stops along the route, from his logbook full of memories and quotations and jotted-down notes about the weather conditions. The people from the past accompany him now, prodding him, showing him what he might have missed before, as he waits for his Marta, his late, remarkable wife, to finally join him on the boat again.

Winner of the prestigious Brage Prize, and considered to be Grytten’s long-awaited masterpiece, The Ferryman and His Wife is the story of a quiet, yet utterly profound, life told in reverse. Timeless and absorbing, this is a novel about what we take with us – those moments that might seem insignificant as they happen but prove to be the most meaningful, in the end.

About the Author

Frode Grytten had his big breakthrough in 1999 with the Brage Prize-winning novel Beehive Song. He is known throughout Norway for his short stories, but has returned to the novel form after over a decade with The Ferryman and His Wife, which was also awarded the Brage Prize, Norway’s most important literary award, and his first book to be translated widely around the world. 