Your Body of Mine: Book Deal with Vine Leaves Press

On the day my collection Woman of the Hour: Fifty Tales of Longing and Rebellion was released, I signed a second book deal with Vine Leaves Press. This time for the novel Your Body of Mine.

My agent pitched my book as follows:

The mind-altering science of the hit show Severance meets the chilling feel of Nordic noir in Your Body of Mine, an upmarket speculative novel by Claire Polders. A woman with a diseased brain. Another with a doomed heart. And a scientist who plays god.

After a groundbreaking surgery, two women battle over the dominion of their single shared body. How far will they go to survive? It’s 2042 in Iceland, and 17-year-old Lilja has a year at most before a parasite in her brain ends her life. But Lilja—fueled by her love for a man she calls the Raven—is not ready to give up on the future. MetaGraft, a transplant clinic, has introduced a radically new procedure, and Lilja vows to become the world’s first body donor.

Alix, age 53, is dying of heart disease, but gets a new lease on life when she is selected to participate in “The Switch.” After doctors from MetaGraft transplant her brain into Lilja’s body, she seems to make a full recovery. But then she begins to hear a voice. Soon her body is a haunted house, for Lilja is alive within and has her own ideas about their fate.

What follows is a battle for dominion that once more threatens their survival. Obsessive love blurs the lines between body and mind, independence and collaboration, life and death.

Set against the harsh Icelandic landscape and rich with imagery, Your Body of Mine, is a haunting story that pushes the boundaries of self and survival.