Almost exactly six years ago, writer Niklas Turner Olovzon’s son got stuck in the elevator in the house where the family lived. He was severely crushed and had a lack of oxygen for around 20 minutes before emergency services and the fire brigade got him free.
At the moment, Niklas is at his parents’ farm in Dalarna. When his wife calls, the son’s heart has stopped beating.
She says he is dead. The rescue personnel do not know if he is dead or not, so in my brain I register that he is dead, says Niklas.
Niklas gets in the car and drives four hours from Dalarna to Nya Karolinska, where his son hovers between life and death. Life changes forever for the family. The son miraculously survives, but has permanent injuries.
He suffered a motor brain injury, but the father describes him as “completely intact intellectually and personality-wise”. He still has all his memories.
He’s a very imaginative, creative and smart guy, but he’s in a wheelchair. We are so happy that it became a sunshine story. He was extremely unlucky, but extremely lucky in how the outcome turned out, says Niklas.
Found his voice after the accident
In the grief and chaos that follows, Niklas’ life takes yet another unexpected turn. He finds writing a form of therapy, and the embryo of a novel he has long carried within him leads to an award-winning debut author. And he doesn’t know if it would have turned out that way if it hadn’t been for the accident that brought everything to a head.
The whole story that I wanted to tell took a different turn. Among other things, I write about a little boy who is abducted in the first book, and it became a kind of therapy because he reminds me a bit of my son, says Niklas.
In the first months after the accident, the son cannot communicate. Writing becomes a way for Niklas to talk to him, and he finds something in his own pain.
My writer older sister Karin Smirnoff talks about finding her pain points. Those pain points can perhaps be transferred to the reader, says Niklas.
His books are not autobiographical, but Niklas believes that the accident helped him find his voice. The traumatic time has led him to write what he thinks is good and what he himself would like to read.
I was a bit biased about what publishers and readers or others would think, and I actually still do. It’s a punkishness I’ve brought with me, he says.
Today 10:21
Writing became writer Niklas Turner Olovzon’s therapy after the elevator accident
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