The Invoice by Jonas Karlsson- Book Review

I received The Invoice by Jonas Karlsson for review from NetGalley and BloggingforBooks. I am not obligated to give a positive review, but I am required to notify the reader how I received the book.

I write a whole bunch. As a pastor, I have to write a new sermon each and every week. There are times that I will have a sermon idea that seems so great, but after about a page of writing, it doesn't seem to go anywhere, so I am forced to abandon it. It is heartbreaking because the idea was so good, but if it doesn't go anywhere, it makes sense to let it go.

I had a similar feeling when reading The Invoice by Jonas Karlsson. The premise for the book is so good! An unnamed video store employee is presented with a bill for $5.7 million kronor. As he investigates the bill, he finds out that it is a bill for his life so far. Things are no longer free- the air, the clouds, the trees, etc and he hasn't paid for any of it. It is now time to pay up and our narrator doesn't know what to do. He starts having a conversation with his case worker, Maud,  from the company that is charging him. As the conversation gets going, our narrator realizes he hasn't really lived at all.

This is such a great premise and I think a lot could have been done with it- questioning what a life is worth, wondering what is important in life, looking at socialism/capitalism, or a whole wide variety of topics. The problem is this very short book doesn't do that much. The main bulk of the story is our narrator trying to figure out why he is being charged the amount he is being charged. He travels back and forth from the company, compares his bill to his friends, and has some very cliche things happen to him throughout the story.

There is a very quick side story of a past love interest which is a really wonderful story and could have been a story in and of itself. The difficulty is it too doesn't get explored. Maud and our narrator have a little love story going as well, but it too isn't too fleshed out. It is as if the author had the idea and just threw some things to flesh out the book a bit. I almost wondered if it was designed to be a short story at first.

I really wanted to like this book, but I am unsure if it is something lost in translation as it is a Swedish book translated into English or if it was just a good premise that the author had trouble filling. Either way, it just kind of fizzled as a whole for me.

I rated this one 2.5 stars simply for the premise and because it was a short read. I would say skip it or take it out of the library.

Here is your Amazon link- The Invoice by Jonas Karlsson