The following is an excerpt from they (1 Feb 2026), an exquisite portrait of a mother and daughter by the award-winning cult Danish writer Helle Helle, translated by Martin Aitken. The first in a trilogy, the book will be followed by Giramondo’s publication of Hafni Says in August 2026 and Hey Hafni in February 2027.

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On the third of April her mother says:

‘I must have swallowed a stone.’

They go for a walk by the playing fields, the anemones are out. Some small boys are playing football, shrieks and shouts, one of them’s crying up against the goalpost. Her mother’s in her winter coat. They’re having beefburgers, hence the walk. She’s wearing an Icelandic sweater herself, it’s still too early yet, the wind cuts through the wool.

‘A stone stone?’ she says, her mother nods.

‘A heavy one. Here.’

She pauses a second and puts a hand to her coat, below the chest. They carry on then towards the pond. The shrubberies are dotted with crocuses, they don’t care for crocuses.

On the way home they bump into Palle, her mother kicks up a leg in delight. Palle’s from Clothes Man, sometimes he comes over and eats his sandwiches with her mother in the shop. When it’s sunny they sit with their feet outside the back door. He’s going to see his niece and is in a hurry, he has a layer cake with him on the luggage rack. He turns and waves to them, the bike wobbles.

They don’t talk about anything on the way home. Just before the square her mother says:

‘I think I’ll ask Palle around for a roast beef dinner one day. Do you think we should?’

‘If you want.’

‘It’s not the sort of thing you cook for yourself, a roast beef dinner.’

She rearranges her room. The noticeboard goes over by the window. She has a number of cuttings and postcards and photographs. The cuttings are fixed with a single pin, they curl up from the bottom as the summer wears on. Her room faces the yard, she watches the dock plants grow at the foot of the rear building. The bin down there is full of hair. At one point a complete pair of plaits. She’s so taken aback that she drops the bin lid with a bang and steps in some coffee grounds, there are always so many coffee grounds.

In June her mother can’t get through her bread and jam. Normally she has a slice with honey too, and half a slice of white with cheese on top. The other half she wraps up and takes with her to the shop. Now she sits and drums her nails on the tabletop next to her plate, it’s strawberry jam, she blows a strand away from her face. She really isn’t hungry. But lots of people have no appetite first thing in the morning.

She herself shuttles between her yoghurt and the mirror in the hall, her German exam starts in an hour, she changes her shirt too.

‘You’re flitting about,’ her mother says.

‘I need to get a move on.’

‘Sit down, for crying out loud.’

‘But I’ll be late.’

‘You’ve got plenty of time.’

‘No, I haven’t.’

‘That suits you, just turn the collar up.’

‘Only you still do that.’

‘Maybe so,’ her mother says and looks at her plate, flexes her fingers.

One of the cuttings is from the Politiken newspaper, she finds a copy on the footpath outside the bakery. She’s never been aware that you can buy that paper at the bakery, and actually you can’t, the baker woman says. Someone’s had it with them and dropped it on their way out. It’s yesterday’s, they study it over the counter. Tourists, most likely. She buys a wholemeal roll and often a single-serve butter packet.

When school breaks up the teachers put on a sketch. Her mother claps and claps, now and then she flaps the song sheet in front of her face, it starts a wave. They open the side door onto the fields. It’s the emergency exit, they’re not supposed to. Outside, everything’s glorious green and blue. During the leavers’ speech, in a short, breathless pause, first the cuckoo is heard, then the lapwing, and everyone laughs.