Reddit mentions of Xenophobe's Guide to the Swedes

Great book that's both funny and pretty accurate: http://www.amazon.com/Xenophobes-Guide-Swedes-Peter-Berlin/dp/1906042497 !

It's pretty thin, but covers a lot of ground on how social conventions go and why we are as we are!

>The Swedes are an enterprising, fair-minded people who suffer from a mild case of megalomania. For example, they think it entirely appropriate that the cartographer Mercator magnanimously drew Sweden roughly the size of India...

Hehe I love that book :D

> Soulful sadness
A common trait among Swedish people is a deeply felt svårmod, a dark melancholy born out of long winters, high taxes, and a sense of being stuck far out on a geo-political and socio-economic limb. They brood a lot over the meaning of life in a self-absorbed sort of way without ever arriving at satisfactory answers.

>Love all
The Swedes indulge in sport for leisure and sex for pleasure. Some people treat sex as a sport in order to combine leisure with pleasure, and thus save time and energy.

>Nurture nature
The Swedes have a dream: to save Nature from Man. This is more than just a vision—it's as close to a passion as the Swedes ever get.

One tip I can give you is that your in-laws most likely speak a lot more English than you think; a lot of Swedes from the older generation are embarassed by their accents or poor grasp of grammar (they measure themselves against the younger generation, who generally speak English better than some English people); they will still be speaking and understanding English at a fairly high level, they might just not be willing to show it out of pride. Once you get to know them, there will be no problem. I've met so many Swedes who are very reluctant to speak English out loud, and then the next minute you see them curling up with Martin Amis's latest - in English!

Secondly, once you get to Sweden there is a free government-run language course for immigrants called "Svenska för invandrare"; you can sign up for this as soon as your papers go through.

Thirdly, for Americans the greatest problem with moving to Sweden is how we relate to strangers; Americans will be friendly and garrulous, Swedes will be reserved and polite. The Americans find the Swedes cold and remote, the Swedes find the Americans fake and over-bearing (Swedes HATE it when a shop-assistant tries to assist them). These are just culture-clashes though, best solved through the liberal use of alcohol. Try to get invited to a party as soon as possible, this is where the Swedes open up. After that, you're friends forever.

I'd also recommend this little book - it's tongue-in-cheek, but VERY spot-on.

I don't have the source readily available (and it may well be bullshit), but it was from a book called "The Xenophobes Guide to the Swedes". The story is old though, it would have happened in the 80s or early 90s.