Reading guide: On the Calculation of Volume I by Solvej Balle, translated by Barbara J. Haveland

In the first part of Solvej Balle’s epic septology, Tara Selter has slipped out of time. Every morning, she wakes up to the 18th of November. 

She no longer expects to wake up to the 19th of November, and she no longer remembers the 17th of November as if it were yesterday. She comes to know the shape of the day like the back of her hand – the grey morning light in her Paris hotel; the moment a blackbird breaks into song; her husband’s surprise at seeing her return home unannounced.   

But for everyone around her, this day is lived for the first and only time. They do not remember the other 18ths of November, and they do not believe her when she tries to explain. As Tara approaches her 365th 18th of November, she can’t shake the feeling that somewhere underneath the surface of this day, there’s a way to escape.  

On the Calculation of Volume I was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025.  

Solvej Balle is a Danish author and publisher.  

She made her debut in 1986 with Lyrebird and went on to write one of the 1990s’ most acclaimed works of Danish literature, According to the Law: Four Accounts of Mankind (1993), which was published in more than ten countries.  

Following this, she disappeared from the spotlight, moving from Copenhagen to the small island of Ærø, where she wrote a handful of works and founded a publishing house, Pelagraf.  

Nearly 30 years later, the first book of a planned septology, On the Calculation of Volume I, was self-published. Five books have been published in Danish so far, with translations underway in over 20 countries. In 2022, Solvej Balle was awarded the prestigious Nordic Council Literature Prize

Hilary Leichter, The New York Times 

‘I braced myself while reading Books I and II of the Danish writer Solvej Balle’s septology, “On the Calculation of Volume,” the story of an antiquarian book dealer who finds herself stuck in a single day. I wondered if repetition, as a form, had anything left to reveal, and then wondered — wait, haven’t I had this thought before? This, too, is a convention of the time-loop plot, the protagonist’s conviction that there’s nothing new to learn, that a moment experienced hundreds of times has been cataloged, conquered and completely understood.’ 

Jake Casella Brookins, Locus Magazine 

‘Balle’s combination of narrator and setup is quietly genius. On the Calculation of Volume is not about comic repetition in the style of Groundhog Day, more in tune with the uncertainty and uncanniness of something like Russian Doll… Balle has nailed – and Haveland has ably translated – a remarkably believable, organic voice, a kind of quotidian existential mode that is equally suited to evocative descriptions of the world and to perceptive ruminations on the nature of time, relationships, and the self.’ 

Rhian Sasseen, The Atlantic 

‘On the Calculation of Volume’s premise could, in other hands, be reduced to a gimmick. But in Haveland’s rendering, Balle’s stripped-down prose has an understated clarity that lends philosophical resonance to this fantastical setup.’ 

Morten Hoi Jensen, The Washington Post 

‘Written in intermittent diary-like entries of varying length, On the Calculation of Volume is at once scrupulously realistic and intriguingly speculative. Balle succeeds in conveying the texture of Tara’s changing feelings, her shifting moods. There are moments of crisis and accident interspersed with bursts of enthusiasm and even, at times, hope.’ 

Publisher’s Weekly 

‘Among the stunning qualities of Balle’s brilliant narrative is the way it suspends judgment, simultaneously sustaining the possibility that Tara has gone insane and that she really is caught in a “rift in time.” There are no easy answers in this deeply mysterious tale. Readers won’t be able to look away.’ 

‘My book is just another time-loop story: A woman, Tara Selter, is trapped in the 18th of November. In a way, I didn’t want to tell this story. I got the idea in 1987 – it probably sprang from some reflections about time after writing my first book, mixed with what I was reading at the time – but the more I thought about it, the more foolish the idea seemed to me, even more so after the Hollywood comedy Groundhog Day came out. I tried to get rid of the idea, but it kept coming back, so in the end I realised that the only way out was to write it. The idea generated so much material that I just wanted to explore it.’  

Read the full interview here.

Tara is trapped in a time loop, experiencing the same day repeatedly. Author Solvej Balle has structured the novel in intermittent, diary-like entries that document her days. Why might Balle have chosen this format, and how did the novel’s structure affect your perception of time while reading? 

Despite reliving the 18^th of November continuously, Tara’s body heals from injury and ages; she consumes items which then disappear, and objects in her vicinity behave unpredictably. She describes her experience as having ‘a different philosophy of things’. How does Balle use these smaller details within the plot to challenge conventional understandings of time and material reality? 

Tara’s isolation is central to the novel. How does Balle explore loneliness, and how do Tara’s relationships with others evolve despite the time loop? 

‘I am a monster and I devour my world,’ Tara reflects, at one point in the novel. What do you think she means by this? How does her experience, stuck within her time loop, change her relationship with the world around her? 

Critics have noted that, beyond the time loop, On the Calculation of Volume I is a love story. ‘Time has come between us,’ Tara writes of her relationship with Thomas – a sentiment that echoes the quiet drift felt in many relationships. How does the novel use Tara’s predicament to explore emotional distance and the ways time shapes intimacy?  

As Tara approaches her 365th November 18th, she feels that somewhere beneath the surface of the day there may be a way to escape. But when that day arrives and she doesn’t find one, what might Tara have to reckon with, as she faces the reality of her situation? 

The New Yorker described the novel as ‘a meditation on climate change’, because Tara’s calendar never turns, and neither does the weather. Do you agree with this interpretation, and did you note this during your reading? Discuss why, or why not. 

The time-loop narrative is a familiar trope, and the novel has been compared to the film Groundhog Day. Balle was also heavily inspired by James Joyce’s Ulysses and its deep exploration of a single day. ‘The thing that fascinated me most was the question: how can one day be so voluminous?’ she told the Guardian, in an interview in 2025. Where do you see these influences intersecting, and how does On the Calculation of Volume I distinguish itself within this single-day narrative tradition? 

When shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2025, the panel of judges said, ‘We live in a world of endless distractions, crises, and despair, and while this book does not present a solution, it may present a pathway to one by bringing us back into a communion with ourselves.’ How does the novel encourage introspection? Did it change the way you think about time, routine, or presence? 

On the Calculation of Volume I is the first in a seven-part series, with parts six and seven still being written. Why do you think Balle chose to tell this story across multiple volumes? What questions might the later books answer? 

According to the Law: Four Accounts of Mankind by Solvej Balle, translated by Barbara J. Haveland 

Orbital by Samantha Harvey

Ulysses by James Joyce  

Flights by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Jennifer Croft 

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson