Safe Return Doubtful

translated from the Swedish by Saskia Vogel – published March 2026

Milde was eight years old when the tropical country she lived in declared a large number of women and their children to no longer be citizens. They were deporting to a borderless zone between the mountains and the sea. The women with little hope or chance of survival, banded together and formed a resilient community, in the Outskirts, and started with a school and pooled resources.

As she becomes an adult, at seventeen, having been deprived of her childhood, Milde and two friends of a similar age, led an uprising, set fire to government buildings in protest. Milde spent the next eleven years in jail, and was subject to torture. Ten years later she was given a choice, to be executed, or sent into a black hole as a pioneer. After she bargained for community improvements for those in the Outskirts, she was sent into space.

Milde’s destiny ahead of being launched into space is described to her in detail early in the book, and one would be forgiven for thinking this was horror or science fiction. But it is not, rather the focus is on how the people of various countries treat those on the margins of society and refugees. Milde’s mother, Essa, and the community she grew up in, has instilled in her strong moral sensibilities and they are dedicated to caring for and protecting one another.

As well as being a good story, this is an angry and timely piece of writing about activism in the face of dictatorship. With bleak and unyielding overtones the prose is challenging and disturbing throughout; the only ray of light coming from the beautifully described, yet stark landscape. As to the degree to which this is speculative, as many reviewers refer to it, I wouldn’t refer to it as such.. rather, a fable with a clear warning attached to it.

My GoodReads score 4 / 5