The Novel Northern Light In Provence by Elizabeth Birkelund is about a young woman IIse Erlund who is a translator and lives in Greenland. IIse wants more out of life than being translator Greenland. She wants to move to France and translate for a French Poet. Only IIse was not prepared for what happened once she started living that dream.

Loving her job, love living in France and all the beauty it had to offer. IIse finds herself falling in love with the poets son. Only to find out he is marring someone else. Then also finding out that he is also becoming a father. What will this young women do now? All she wanted was a better life doing a job she loved living in a beautiful country. She didn't ask for a broken heart. How do you not shed some tears for this poor girl?

Beautifully written makes you want to pack up and move to France. Not your typical love story yet you were hoping for a happy ending. Would totally recommend it .

Thank you NetGalley and Random House for the ARC.

An isolated, grieving translator is given the unusual opportunity to work closely with a poet on his work, and travels from her home in Greenland to the south of France, where she finds a renewed sense of beauty and wonder in the world, reckons with difficult decisions, makes mistakes, learns from them, and changes her life for the better. It might sound sentimental, but this is a gorgeous book that is very human, invested in language and precision and awe, and develops places and characters that are rich and relatable. Highly recommend, especially for people interested in language.

This book was so beautiful that I wanted to savor every second of it. It’s a love story, but one unlike any I’ve read before. This is a story of the love of words, cultures, people, and place…and the changes that occur in them. It is all of these that help Ilse find herself, save herself. This book was just lovely, and I highly recommend it.

Thank you Ballantine Books for inviting me to read this novel. I loved the story of Ilse, a woman who makes her living translating books, speaks fluent French, and lives very remotely in Iceland. She convinces her editor to pay for her to visit a French village where she'll translate the work of a Provencal poet and the last living "troubadour." The trip is life-changing as she spends countless hours with the French poet getting the history and nuances of his poetry, and whilst doing that, spends time taking stock of her life at home. She's had a tumultuous relationship with her mother that was exacerbated by the death of her only brother five years prior in a motorcycle accident. Since losing her brother, Ilse has shut herself off from her family, friends, and any notion of love. Living in the little French village, meeting new people, and having new experiences opens her eyes to a more substantial future. Ilse becomes very close to the poet, and his sister and son, and when she returns to Iceland she is determined to make real changes. When she loses her home, it sets in motion some major decisions that she's prepared to make with fresh eyes having had the experience of life outside her small town. I highly recommend this enchanting read by Elizabeth Birkelund.

I am a lover of language and France so I was very drawn to this book. I enjoyed it. As others have mentioned it drags a bit but stick with it and you will be so happy you did.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️- {A NORTHERN LIGHT IN PROVENCE -Elizabeth Birkelund}

The landscapes of this novel are the true star. I felt genuinely transported to the luscious vineyards and sun warmed streets of Provence as well as to Greenlands isolated wet lands and melting icebergs. Romance and poetry flow through the pages as the main character Ilse experiences intellectual love, passionate love, and an unwavering love all in a matter of months. She finds her true self while translating the poems of a famous elderly poet known as the “last true troubadour of Provence” and lives along side him, his many dogs, vintage wines and love for the spoken word. If your looking to immerse yourself in a charming French village and fall in love with its cast of characters this book will take you there!
Thanks to @netgalley for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

What a beautiful story of love, literature, language, across multiple cultures. I knew nothing about Greenland before and now I want to read more of it! Not to soil anything but it is not the predictable story you might imagine at the beginning or even halfway through and that was a delightful turn of events. Take a chance on Ilse!


I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Ilse seems numb in her life, going through the paces. A translater, she receives the opportunity to leave Greenland for Provence, to translate poetry, and has such an emotionally transformative journey. I really liked her character, and enjoyed the softer moving pace of this novel.

Though I wish some of the characters were more developed, I found the descriptions gorgeous and they painted the most vivid pictures.

Overall, I found this to be a very pleasant read.



Thank you to Ballantine Books and NetGalley for the DRC!

This book's gentle flow and rhythm make it a delightful read.

Book lovers, and lovers of language, will certainly warm to it. The beautiful story of a woman in love with words certainly hits all the right feels!

Ilse is just such a lovely character. The reader cannot help but love her, and fall into her story. It's love and loss and beauty and pain.

"Your words are fairer than you," she says. She's been reading too much troubadour poetry..." (chapt 28)

To me, the best part about this book is that we, the English-speaking readers, are reading it in translation!

So many lovely layers! So many warm and beautiful pictures in the gentle prose! A must-read!

"Ilse remembers the poem by Robert Frost asking whether the world will end in ice or fire. 'Mr. Frost, you got it wrong. The world will end in water.'" (chapt 36)

A Northern Light in Provence is, as the title suggests, a book filled with contrasts. Greenland and Provence could not be more different. The protagonist and narrator, Ilse, is a translator who lives in a remote village in Greenland, where she isolates herself in a home on stilts, and where she hides from life. Greenland is dark, cold, and wet, while Provence is warm and filled with soft light from the sun. Initially, Ilse sees herself as French at heart. Provence calls to her. Ilse's journey from Greenland to Provence and the choices she makes in each location are the focus of Elizabeth Birkelund's novel, A Northern Light in Provence.

Like nature and life, poetry is filled with contradictions and is open to interpretation, which means that translating from one language to another presents a challenge far more difficult than the translation of a novel. To Translate poetry, Ilse needs to journey to Provence, where she meets the poet who opens her life to possibilities. A Northern Light in Provence, is a book filled with contrasts and choices and the search for acceptance and love.

The story within A Northern Light in Provence is a novel filled with opposites, with choices between fantasy and reality and the discovery of the different ways that nature can be experienced. Birkelund's novel opens slowly, with descriptions of Greenland that seemingly close the novel and narrator's life to possibilities. Descriptions of family conflict, loss and grief, and descriptions of nature and weather make the escape to Provence even more appealing. And in fact, Provence opens the protagonist Ilse's life to possibilities. In Provence, she puts aside the grief she felt after her brother's death, a grief that has paralyzed her. In Provence, she begins to live again. In translating the Poet/Po's verse, his words teach her about the possibilities of love and the ability of love to heal. The contrasts continue with Po, who continues to create poetry, while his life approaches an end, and with Ilse, for whom the poet's words serve to remind her that it is still possible to love and be loved.

With the exception of Ilse's mother, Birkelund's characters are complex, with hidden facets of personality. The secrets that Ilse discovers by the end of the novel allow her to change and move on with her life. A Northern Light in Provence is beautifully written. The deceptively unappealing Greenland world that opens the novel is misleading. Birkelund's prose seemingly comes alive in Provence, but that is a beautifully constricted analogy for Ilse's heart and life. In Greenland, Ilse is closed and dark, while in Provence, she is open and filled with light. Ilse's transformation lies at the heart of A Northern Light in Provence.

I want to thank the author, Penguin Random House, and NetGalley for making this ARC available for me to read and review. These comments are my own opinion of A Northern Light in Provence. .

When I first started reading this book I was convinced I would hate it and had to force myself to way through the first few chapters. And then, something changed. I can’t even say exactly when it happened but I became entranced with the story, the characters, and didn’t want it to end.

The book itself was well written and the characters so well developed that I could see greeting them like friends should we meet. But it was the descriptions of places, weather, relationships, and feelings that pulled me in and hooked me. An amazing book I will definitely read again!

I received an arc of this book and voluntarily provided a review.

Beautiful story of an interpreter from Norway and poet
from France and their love affair of words and cultures to sort out.

Ilse is a translator who lives in Greenland, surrounded by the icy sea and calving icebergs. Having fallen in love with the French language thanks to her high school teacher, she jumps at the chance to travel to Provence to translate the latest work of the last Provencal poet. I am conflicted on this one. It was interesting to read about Greenland and the challenges of living in a frozen environment, and the loneliness Ilse felt at the loss of her brother. But the first half of the book dragged. Even after she moved to Provence, I felt detached, as if I were watching a travelogue. The second half of the book, however, picked up as we delved into the relationships Ilse formed with the poet and his son. The complexities of these relationships, as well as those back home in Greenland showed Ilse’s character growth and led to a satisfying ending. Three stars, Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for giving m an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Ilse lives with her cat in coastal Greenland in a house on stilts that's about to fall into the ocean. Her existence is deliberately bleak, as she is devastated by the death of her brother, five years previous, and due to guilt, she doesn't allow herself more. In her thirties, she is frozen, working remotely as a book translator. Her village is so small it's barely that. Her one significant boyfriend has moved on to her best friend, a development Ilse is fine with. She just seems numb. One day, in a surge of desperate longing, she tells her agent she'll only take on a certain new translation job if she can go to Provence for two weeks and meet with the poet face to face. Shockingly, he agrees, and she goes there. Drama ensues, and Ilse is changed by the experience.

The descriptions were sublime, but the writing could be choppy, as when a chapter would lead to an event but then end abruptly; in the next scene, we would hear what happened in retrospect. Also, some of the characters were underdeveloped, including her mother (a fascinatingly bitter person) and the love interest, Frey, for whom Ilse's attraction was puzzling. However, I enjoyed imagining life in Greenland at an everyday level, and the settings in Provence were delightful.

A lovely story—set in Greenland and Provence—of one woman discovering herself and sorting out her dreams. Ilse translates novels, including from French to English despite never having set foot in France. She has steady work though she is a little lonely and still grieving the death of her beloved brother five years later. While translating a particularly tricky novel, Ilse gains some confidence and dares ask for a raise and a trip to France so she can work with her next author, a famous Provençal poet, in person. Ilse soon falls in love with everything about Provence and is enthralled by the poets words.

The writing was beautiful and helps readers picture Ilse’s remote hometown and lush Provence. There are some twists in Ilse’s story before it comes to a satisfying conclusion. Recommended to anyone looking for a cozy, life-affirming story of someone trying to figure out what home and happiness means to them.

Thank you very much to Random House Ballantine and NetGalley for the opportunity to read a copy.

This book is a enchanting trip to Provance France. The author writes atmospheric descriptions that have the reader able to imagine the lavender fields, the food and culture. The author captured my imagnation from the beginning to end. She writes beautifully of a young naive Greenland woman who is a translator. She has never ventured anywhere but her home and has a job in Provance to translate a book. Her senses, her life and her future take a unexpected turn as she explores Provance and all it has to offer her. Well done to the author. A book I highly recommend for your reading enjoyment. .

Thank you to Net Galley, the author and the publisher for the opportunity. My review opinions are my own,

I felt this was beautifully written and lived the locale and premise it was a feel good escape kind of book

A Northern Light in Provence may be the first novel ever written about the work of a translator. Or it may just be the first one I have ever read. I found it fascinating. Birkelund not only makes the work translation clearly understandable, but she has a gift for describing geographical locations so beautifully that i found myself back in Provence in the spring, inhaling the odor of flowers and feeling the breeze, walking among the grapes of a vineyard.

Greenland, a misnomer for that island country for sure. It also becomes palpable, (though I've never been there).. This land of calving glaciers and months of darkness, an icy island in the frigid sea, and Ilse's house on stilts that sits on the edge of it, made me feel as if I had been there.

Ilse was influenced by a beloved French teacher and fell in love with the language. That explains why she translates French fiction (and poetry into English. She has never left Greenland until being hired by her publisher to translate the poetry of a "troubadour" from Provence. She forms a special, loving attachment to Po, this 70-year-old poet..

The time Ilse spends in Provence, the people she meets, the warmth she feels for the first time in her life enchanted me. Her characters are amazing, be they her Greenlander family and friends or the neighbors of Po's.

There are some hair-raising dangers Ilse faces in both places, (being lost in a strange country and falling into a sinkhole), as well as a decision about choices that move the book along. I enjoyed its atmosphere and ability to make me feel as if I had been visiting two very different climates and cultures. The book may not be fast-paced, but it is emotional and engrossing.

Thanks so much to NetGalley and Penguin Random House for an ARC copy of this book.

Thank you NetGalley and Penguin Random House for an advanced copy of this book in return for an honest and unbiased review.

Beautiful prose, a soft love story, human connection; A Northern Light in Provence has all of that and more. Ilse, a native Greenlander, who works as a translator and has never left Greenland, longs for more in the world. Isle has never traveled outside of her comforting, yet cold, home of Greenland. So, to travel to Provencal France to help translate a work of poetry seems like a dream come true. Along the way she learns how to live, how to love, how to see things for what they are, and who she is.
Did I cry at the end of this book? Yes, and at points throughout it as well. I really cannot express how beautifully Birkelund writes, I was captured by her flow of sentences and story development. That said, there were moments in the book that felt rushed, too cliché, and a little fabricated. Though, this was not frequent. I think I did not enjoy the rush at which Po’s life changed, the character of Frey (although I see his value in story development), nor some of the choppiness of scene changes. Although this is definitely a, “me problem”, I did not necessarily enjoy the third person writing… Ilse’s name was mentioned too many times for my taste and it made me feel like I was watching her, not experiencing what she experienced. However, it could also be argued that this was a writing technique that was intended. Overall, I enjoyed my reading experience throughout and thought it was a beautifully curated book.



Would I Recommend: Yes, I would recommend this to most people who enjoy slow love stories, self-discovery, travel, and rich prose.

3.5 Stars

I absolutely loved this book! The premise is unique, and the book is written beautifully. The author brought both its locales to life. I found the descriptions of life in Greenland fascinating, and the contrast between Greenland and Provence was amazing in terms of both their people and environments. The author's use of language was exceptional. The plot had many twists and turns, and I couldn't put the book down. Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for letting me read an advance copy of this book. I plan to read the author's previous books, and I look forward to the next. I highly recommend this book, and I think it would be an excellent choice for book discussion groups.