The wood book. Thus, without any more flourishes or mysteries. The subtitle A life in the woods it's not pretentious either. The author, an unknown Norwegian writer (until now) named Lars Mytting, sweeps the entire planet with this treatise on wood, or rather, on the art of cutting wood. It can be more daring and original by betting on such an idea to stand out and eat up the publishing market?

Perhaps some great names in Nordic literature must be stunned (or not) at the smash hit of Mytting, a journalist born in 1968, who had already written three novels. This instruction manual and song to the simple life in nature has already sold all over the world half a million copies and has been translated into 16 languages. We analyze this best-selling phenomenon.

What if I write a book about that feeling, a book in which the lumberjacks tell their interests and ambitions, but which does not seem like a presumptuous vision of an urbanite like me, but something that my neighbor might want to read?

That was said one day by Lars Mytting (Fåvang, 1968) and he got to it. The result, The wood book, an unusual (at least) treatise on the art of cutting wood, an instruction manual and advice on trees and those different types of wood. But also a treatise on meditation on survival instinct and praise of life in the woods. And he succeeded in attracting attention.

The unexpected sales success in its launch on the market has made it the reference title of a movement which is increasingly on the rise: the one of the standard bearers of the return to nature, to the so-called "quiet life." Thus, the most geeks of the subject open its pages and can almost smell the aroma of the forest, the earth, the grass and the trees. And that so special of the firewood that they have just cut in a vigorous and revitalizing effort with their most efficient ax.

Wood, trees, forest, tranquility ...

Such a simple, simple and calm story can only be told well by a person born, raised and raised in one of the countries most full of natural resources to combat a cold that is always on them.

In those northern parts the winter always its coming. And their consumption of firewood has not decreased one iota, despite the fact that the Norwegians do not lack oil. But they continue to consume, only there, about 300 kilos per family. Half of that wood is cut directly themselves. From there came the idea to Mytting.

One day he saw a elderly and sick neighbor who went out every morning to saw a firewood which still had to dry before using it for that winter. To Mytting it seemed like a ritual for a future his neighbor might no longer see. And I think the metaphor of man's relationship with wood as the loss of the authentic and simple in this time marked by immediacy and technology.

mytting claim to do things for yourself. It invites you to get into the skin of that woodcutter who deals face to face with the ancestral being that also represents wood. How it refers us to fire and its power with thousands of meanings such as warmth or comfort.

Echoes of Thoreau

Mytting has been compared to the classic of the XIX, Henry David Thoreau. The American poet, philosopher, essayist and naturalist portrayed his life during two years in nature in his work Walden. But of course, you have to bridge the distances of time, thought and scenarios.

Inexplicable success?

Obviously not. There are readers for all tastes and all sensibilities. If you are a hopeless urbanite and addicted to noise, you may not be drawn to this book. But lovers of leisurely pace and communion with nature are enjoying it with unspeakable pleasure.