Fiction in translation
Pan Macmillan The Tobacconist
Book Synopsis'Set at a time of lengthening shadows, this is a novel about the sparks that illuminate the dark: of wisdom, compassion, defiance and courage. It is wry, piercing and also, fittingly, radiant.' Daily MailFrom Robert Seethaler, the author of the Man Booker International shortlisted A Whole Life, comes a deeply moving story of ordinary lives profoundly affected by the Third Reich, in the tradition of novels such as Fred Uhlman's classic Reunion, Bernhard Schlink's The Reader and Rachel Seiffert's The Dark Room.When seventeen-year-old Franz exchanges his home in the idyllic beauty of the Austrian lake district for the bustle of Vienna, his homesickness quickly dissolves amidst the thrum of the city. In his role as apprentice to the elderly tobacconist Otto Trsnyek, he will soon be supplying the great and good of Vienna with their newspapers and cigarettes. Among the regulars is a Professor Freud, whose predilection for cigars and occasional willingness to dispense romantic advice will forge a bond between him and young Franz.It is 1937. In a matter of months Germany will annex Austria and the storm that has been threatening to engulf the little tobacconist will descend, leaving the lives of Franz, Otto and Professor Freud irredeemably changed.Trade ReviewSet at a time of lengthening shadows, this is a novel about the sparks that illuminate the dark: of wisdom, compassion, defiance and courage. It is wry, piercing and also, fittingly, radiant. * Daily Mail *Seethaler blends tragedy and whimsy to create a bittersweet picture of youthful ideals getting clobbered by external forces. The result is a little like Great Expectations, only with dachshunds and strudel. * Observer *Essential reading for the early years of the 21st century. * Scotland on Sunday *[The Tobacconist’s] portrayal of pre-war Vienna is tender and elegiac. There are echoes of Arthur Schnitzler in Fran’z feverish obsession with Anezka, Ödön von Horváth in minor characters such as the neighbouring butcher who denounces the tobacconist to the Gestapo, and Robert Musil in the texture of the city. The moment when the frail, ill Dr Freud boards the train for London is an elegy for the cultural and intellectual glory of early twentieth-century Vienna . . . The Tobacconist remains unwavering in its quiet, understated style and it is all the more devastating for it. * Times Literary Supplement *Told with a dry wit that enhances, rather than disguises, the sadness of its story, The Tobacconist is a touching miniature of an ordinary life irrevocably altered by the larger forces of history. * Sunday Times *Robert Seethaler's The Tobacconist is a poignant, tragic look at the creeping rise of fascism in Vienna before the outbreak of the Second World War. Told with humor and pity, the novel expertly depicts how easy it is to find, and lose, one's place in the world . . . [The Tobacconist] brilliantly demonstrates how even small actions can give a person meaning in the face of dire threats. * Shelf Awareness *I enjoyed Robert Seethaler’s The Tobacconist. The novel sets up a tiny tobacconist’s shop in 1930s Vienna as a window on to a street, a city and a continent, all drifting into conflict. -- Ed Smith * New Statesman *
£999.99
Quercus Publishing The Life of Rebecca Jones
Book SynopsisA poetic work of fiction on the one hand, an autobiography on the other, The Life of Rebecca Jones is about one family's passage through the twentieth century. A fictional elegy to a threatened way of life.Trade ReviewAngharad Price's reflection of family history through the prism of fiction is a restrained, lyrical tour de force . . . Shot through with meditations on blindness and insight, this account of one family's passage through the twentieth century is skilfully rendered with grace and quiet power. -- Owen Sheers'How does it feel to write a classic novel? This is what Angharad Price has managed with The Life of Rebecca Jones' Tom Payne, Telegraph. * Telegraph *Angharad Price's reflection of family history through the prism of fiction is a restrained, lyrical tour de force . . . Shot through with meditations on blindness and insight, this account of one family's passage through the twentieth century is skilfully rendered with grace and quiet power. -- Owen Sheers
£8.99
Vintage Publishing The Trial
Book SynopsisIt is not necessary to accept everything as true, one must only accept it as necessary'Rediscover Kafka''s classic work of psychological horror. The Trial is the terrifying tale of Joseph K, a respectable functionary in a bank, who is suddenly arrested and must defend his innocence against a charge about which he can get no information. A nightmare vision of the excesses of modern bureaucracy wedded to the insanity of twentieth-century totalitarianism has resonated with readers for generations.WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY PHILLIPE SANDSTrade ReviewIt is the fate and perhaps the greatness of that work that it offers everything and confirms nothing -- Albert CamusThe Dante of the Twentieth Century -- W. H. AudenNo other voice has borne truer witness to the dark of our times -- George Steiner
£8.54
Vintage Publishing The Bridge Over the Drina
Book SynopsisIn the small Bosnian town of Visegrad the stone bridge of the novel's title, built in the sixteenth century on the instruction of a grand vezir, bears witness to three centuries of conflict. Visegrad has long been a bone of contention between the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian Empires, but the bridge survives unscathed until 1914, when the collision of forces in the Balkans triggers the outbreak of World War I.The bridge spans generations, nationalities and creeds, silent testament to the lives played out on it. Radisav, a workman, tries to hinder its construction and is impaled alive on its highest point; beautiful Fata leaps from its parapet to escape an arranged marriage; Milan, inveterate gamble, risks all in one last game on it. With humour and compassion, Andric chronicles the lives of Catholics, Muslims and Orthodox Christians unable to reconcile their disparate loyalties.Trade ReviewIn high school, one Saturday, I started reading a book by the Yugoslav novelist Ivo Andric: The Bridge on the Drina. By the time I finished it something in me had shifted forever * New Statesman *Despite its scale, what makes the book extraordinary is the tender insight with which it treats these individual lives, whether Catholic, Orthodox, Muslim or Jewish * Independent *Perhaps the most widely translated Yugoslav book since the last war is Ivo Andric's The Bridge on the Drina... No better example could have been selected with which to introduce the American public to contemporary Yugoslav prose * New York Times *The best kind of fictionalised history * Daily Telegraph *The wealth and variety of its fictional elements carry it so far beyond the confines of a straightforward novel, it cannot be limited to such a description. It puts one in mind of a collection of tales, but no collection of tales (not even A Thousand and One Nights or Washington Irving's stories) ever possessed such a unity and continuity of theme * Le Monde *
£999.99
Alma Books Ltd The Sorrows of Young Werther
Book SynopsisPresented as a collection of confessional letters written by the eponymous protagonist, The Sorrows of Young Werther charts the emotional journey of a young man who, during a stay in a picturesque German village, falls in love with Lotte, a local woman engaged to another man. As he realizes that his passion is doomed to failure and constant pain, Werther contemplates taking the most drastic measures. Partly autobiographical, and the prototype for many later Romantic works in its depiction of the sensitive, tortured hero, Goethe's seminal classic is a timeless masterpiece of world literature.Trade ReviewI categorically say: read The Sorrows of Young Werther! -- Franz Kafka
£7.59
Penguin Books Ltd The Romance of the Three Kingdoms
Book SynopsisA new translation and abridgement of one of the four classical Chinese novels - an epic story of warring factions in the era of China''s Han dynastyPart historical and part legend, The Romance of the Three Kingdoms dramatizes the lives of feudal lords and their retainers, recounting their personal and military battles, intrigues and struggles to achieve dominance for almost a hundred years. It is one of the most beloved works of East Asian literature, and the most famous historical novel in China.
£12.34
Penguin Books Ltd Bonjour Tristesse
Book SynopsisIntroducing Little Clothbound Classics: irresistible, mini editions of short stories, novellas and essays from the world''s greatest writers, designed by the award-winning Coralie Bickford-SmithCelebrating the range and diversity of Penguin Classics, they take us from snowy Japan to springtime Vienna, from haunted New England to a sun-drenched Mediterranean island, and from a game of chess on the ocean to a love story on the moon. Beautifully designed and printed, these collectible editions are bound in colourful, tactile cloth and stamped with foil.Published when she was only eighteen, Françoise Sagan''s astonishing novella, Bonjour Tristesse, became an instant bestseller. It tells the story of Cécile, who leads a carefree life with her widowed father and his young mistresses until, one hot summer on the Riviera, he decides to remarry - with devastating consequences.
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd No One Writes to the Colonel
Book SynopsisNobel Laureate Gabriel García Márquez, author of One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera, tells a powerful tale of poverty and undying hope in his moving novel No One Writes to the Colonel. ''The Colonel took the top off the coffee can and saw that there was only one spoonful left''Fridays are different. Every other day of the week, the Colonel and his ailing wife fight a constant battle against poverty and monotony, scraping together the dregs of their savings for the food and medicine that keeps them alive. But on Fridays the postman comes - and that sets a fleeting wave of hope rushing through the Colonel''s ageing heart.For fifteen years he''s watched the mail launch come into harbour, hoping he''ll be handed an envelope containing the army pension promised to him all those years ago. Whilst he waits for the cheque, his hopes are pinned on his prize bird and the upcoming cockfighting season. But until theTrade ReviewOne of this century's most evocative writers -- Anne Tyler
£9.49
Coach House Books The Dark Library
Book SynopsisLibraries are magical places. But what if they’re even more magical than we know? In Cyrille Martinez’s library, the books are alive: not just their ideas or their stories, but the books themselves. Meet the Angry Young Book, who has strong opinions about who reads what and why. He’s tired of people reading bestsellers, so he places himself on the desks of those who might appreciate him. Meet the Old Historian who mysteriously vanished from the stacks. Meet the Blue Librarian, the Mauve Librarian, the Yellow Librarian, and spend a day with the Red Librarian trying to banish coffee cups and laptops. Then one day there are no empty desks anywhere in the Great Library. A great horde of student workers has descended, and they will scan every single book in the library: the much-borrowed, the neglected, the popular, the obscure. What will happen to the library then? Will it still be necessary? The Dark Library is a theoretical fiction, a meditation on what libraries mean in our digital world. Has the act of reading changed? What is a reader? A book? Martinez, a librarian himself, has written a love letter to the urban forest of the dark, wild library, where ideas and stories roam free.Trade Review"The caustic and often hilarious story of the misadventures of a library, all the concerns and issues facing the professions … The fantastic with a hint of irony of Cyrille Martinez’s writing is reminiscent of Marcel Aymé." –Livres Hebdo"A poignant and shrewd commentary on changing readership demands, The Dark Library also shows an appreciation for those readers, and the librarians who serve them, too.” –Booklist"Over a documentary base that it itself worth reading, he composes a passionate fiction, almost fantastic, showing the defeat of the printed word by the digital." –L’Humanité"French writer and librarian Martinez explores the purpose of libraries amid sweeping societal changes in this whimsical novel. ... satire with wit and quirky characters. This will delight fans of absurdist fiction." –Publishers Weekly"Martinez, a librarian himself, has written a love letter to the urban forest of the dark, wild library, where ideas and stories roam free." –Malvern Books
£11.39
Pushkin Press The Unworthy
Book SynopsisA fearsomely dark, incantatory new dystopia set in a post-apocalyptic convent from the author of viral sensation Tender is the Flesh'Barbaric, brutal and utterly beautiful. The Unworthy is a searing haunt of a novel that I will never forget' LUCY ROSE, AUTHOR OF THE LAMBIn the House of the Sacred Sisterhood, the unworthy live in fear of the Superior Sister's whip. Seething with resentment, they plot against each other and await who will ascend to the level of the Enlightened - and who will suffer the next exemplary punishment.Risking her life, one of the unworthy keeps a diary in secret. Slowly, memories surface from a time before the world collapsed, before the Sacred Sisterhood became the only refuge.Then Lucía arrives. She, too, is unworthy - but she is different. And her presence brings a single spark of hope to a world of darkness.
£15.29
Dedalus Ltd T Take Six (Six Portuguese Women Writers)
Book SynopsisA remarkable work of horror, half-way between Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
£11.78
HarperCollins Publishers Grand Hotel Europa
Book SynopsisTHE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLERIlja Leonard Pfeijffer's moving and addictive masterpiece of European identity, nostalgia and the end of an era.A masterpiece: grandiose style, brilliant and rich. It will defy the ages' Trouw (The Netherlands)The love of my life lives in my past. That is, despite the alliteration, a terrible sentence to write. I do not want to come to the conclusion that, as it is the case for the hotel where I am staying and the continent after which it is named, the best time is behind me and that I have little more to expect from the future than to live on my past.'A writer takes residence in the illustrious but decaying Grand Hotel Europa, to think about where things went wrong with Clio, with whom he fell in love in Genoa and moved to Venice. He reconstructs a compelling story of love in times of mass tourism, about their trips to Malta, Palmaria, Portovenere and the Cinque Terre and their thrilling search for the last painting of Caravaggio. Meanwhile, he becomes fascTrade Review‘It wants to impress, and it impresses. It is that big-bigger-biggest grip which makes the novel into an astounding masterpiece. It is also a wonderful book, which you will read with increasingly feverish eagerness. Pfeijffer captures the zeitgeist and serves it up irresistibly. He wrote the novel of the year’ NRC Handelsblad (The Netherlands) ‘A masterpiece: grandiose style, brilliant and rich. It will defy the ages’ Trouw (The Netherlands) ‘Grand Hotel Europa is not only an overwhelming reading experience, but Pfeijffer also gives you lots of food for thought. Who else in contemporary Dutch literature could do what he does, to turn up the heat on our zeitgeist in such a great way and to thumb the nose at all those timid, tiny novels full of first world problems?’ De Morgen (Belgium) ‘A pageturner. The most admirable thing about the novel is Pfeijffer’s fascination with these subjects, his involvement. […] Grand Hotel Europa is not only an reflection on our identity, but also a contribution to its continuation’ de Volkskrant (The Netherlands) ‘A lively, clever and sometimes malicious book. […] Ilja Leonard Pfeijffer conceived his Grand Hotel Europa not only as a homage to the aged, mythically charged continent, but also as a stage and forum for debate for the contradictions and upheavals of our time. […] The pleasure of reading it all for yourself, right up to the amazing end, shouldn’t be taken away from you anyway’ Süddeutsche Zeitung (Germany) ‘The new Magic Mountain is perhaps called Grand Hotel Europa’ Neue Ruhr Zeitung (Germany) ‘A powerful and intriguing novel that one doesn’t forget easily’ La Stampa (Italy) ‘A great novel, brilliantly told and absolutely worth reading’ Ruhr Nachrichten (Germany)
£10.44
Fitzcarraldo Editions The Book of All Loves
Book SynopsisIn the wake of the Great Blackout, faced with the near-extinction of humanity, a pair of lovers speak to each other. They parse, with precision, with familiarity, the endless aspects of their love. Out of their dialogues, piece by piece, a composite image of love takes form, one that moves outwards beyond the realm of relationships and into metaphysics, geology, linguistics, AI. Years previously, a writer and her husband, a Latin professor, stay in Venice while she works on a text. As they roam the city, strange occurrences accumulate, signalling that the world around them is heading towards a point of no return. Blending fiction and essay, poetry and philosophy, Agustín Fernández Mallo’s The Book of All Loves is a startling, expansive work of imaginative agility, one that renders love unfamiliar so as to renew it, and makes the case for hope in the midst of a disintegrating present. Trade Review‘Here, a sense of menace and a kind of melancholy tension are beautifully realised in Mallo’s brooding prose.’ — Michael Cronin, Irish Times‘There are certain writers whose work you turn to knowing you’ll find extraordinary things there. Borges is one of them, Bolaño another. Agustín Fernández Mallo has become one, too.’ — Chris Power, author of A Lonely Man‘A protean taxonomy of love whose shape veers between three modes, that of commonplace book, gendered dialogue and metafiction. Agustín Fernández Mallo finds not one but many envelopes to contain the cosmos.’ — Jesse Ball, author of Autoportrait‘The Book of All Loves defies definition. The prose gallops on from one shining brilliance to the next, both disarmingly playful and devastating. Gorgeous, melancholic, mysterious – it is a book to be read again, many times.’ — Claire Oshetsky, author of Chouette‘In his Book of All Loves, Fernández Mallo offers us an encyclopaedia of loves, each one sounding – as if for the first time – as a pure tone, from an infinite spectrum of tones. Here is a book unlike any other, a book that recreates and regenerates love, even as it asks us whether it is strong enough to hold.’ — Amy Arnold, author of Lori & Joe‘The Book of All Loves is a deeply poetic novel ... Fernández Mallo reflects on the present through the past, and projects us into a future where the conditions of the self, the environment, relationships and the body are all called into question.’ — El Mundo‘Reading Agustín Fernández Mallo is the closest thing in literature to putting on a VR headset.' — La Vanguardia‘The Book of All Loves is at once an essay, an ode and a gospel, where two lovers become the link between one world ending and another being born, and using deep geological time to explain why some people stay with us our whole lives.’ — ABC España‘The most original and powerful author of his generation in Spain.’ — Mathias Enard, author of The Annual Banquet of the Gravediggers' Guild‘One of the best writers in Spanish, with an absolutely unique style and fictional world.’ — Jorge Carrión, New York Times in Spanish‘A strange and original sensibility at work – one that combines a deep commitment to the possibilities of art with a gonzo spirit and a complete absence of pretention.’ — Christopher Beha, Harper’s
£10.44
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC The Last Apartment in Istanbul
Book SynopsisThrough its 75-year-old narrator, Pericles Drakos, The Last Apartment in Istanbul tells the story of Istanbul's deterioration, beginning from the Coronavirus crisis and weaving its way backwards to the 1950s
£17.00
HarperCollins Publishers Eleven Minutes
Book SynopsisThe bestselling novel from international literary phenomenon Paulo Coelho, author of The Alchemist.A chance meeting in Rio takes Maria to Geneva, where she dreams of finding fame and fortune, yet ends up working the streets as a prostitute. In Geneva, Maria drifts further and further away from love while at the same time developing a fascination with sex.Eventually, Maria''s despairing view of love is put to the test when she meets a handsome young painter. In this odyssey of self-discovery, Maria has to choose between pursuing a path of darkness, sexual pleasure for its own sake', or risking everything to find her own ''inner light'' and the possibility of sacred sex, sex in the context of love.A daring modern fable about the nature of love and sex.Trade ReviewPRAISE FOR ELEVEN MINUTES “Has a strange and potent chemistry of its own.” The Observer “Coelho has a deceptively simple but elegant writing style which sits well with this strange but gripping tale.” Glasgow Evening Times “Refreshing and insightful…an uplifting read.” What’s On In London “A simply-told fable for our times, highlighting the quest for personal spiritual enlightenment.” Belfast Telegraph Awarded 4 stars in New Woman magazine review
£9.49
Orenda Books The Darkest Winter
Book Synopsis
£17.09
HarperCollins Publishers The Ice Princess
Book SynopsisThe gripping psychological thriller debut of No 1 bestselling Swedish crime sensation Camilla Läckberg.Heart-stopping and heart-warming, The Ice Princess is a masterclass in Scandinavian crime writing' Val McDermid*One of TIME's best mystery and thriller books of all time*A small town can hide many secretsReturning to her hometown after the funeral of her parents, writer Erica Falck finds a community on the brink of tragedy. The death of her childhood friend, Alex, is just the beginning. Her wrists slashed, her body frozen in an ice-cold bath, it seems like she's taken her own life.Meanwhile, local detective Patrik Hedström is following his own suspicions about the case. It's only when they start working together that the truth begins to emerge about a small town with a deeply disturbing pastTrade ReviewPraise for The Ice Princess: ‘Heart-stopping and heart-warming, ‘The Ice Princess’ is a masterclass in Scandinavian crime writing’ Val McDermid ‘Camilla Läckberg is a more than welcome addition to the growing ranks of Scandinavian crime writers translated into English. With its sharp emotional nuances and psychological insight, ‘The Ice Princess’ builds in suspense as the author turns her clear eye on the buried secrets and contemporary relationships of a small, isolated community. I predict that Fjallbacka and its crimes and people will soon be as poplular here as they are in her native Sweden’ Peter Robinson ‘Another top-class Scandinavian crime writer reaches the British market’ The Times ‘A welcome new voice in crime fiction’ Woman & Home ‘Has a brooding quality redolent of its barren Swedish landscapes… intriguing and not a little disturbing’ Irish Times ‘Chilly, deceptive and lucid, just like the icy environment it describes’ Literary Review Praise for Camilla Lackberg: ‘Domesticity and brutality are Lackberg staples… Tightly plotted… Unflinching.’ Sunday Times ‘Pacy … with flashing insight into the dark places of the psyche’ Sunday Times ‘A top-class Scandinavian crime writer’ The Times ‘The rock star of Nordic Noir’ Independent ‘Lackberg is an expert at mixing scenes of domestic cosiness with blood-curdling horror’ Guardian ‘Both chilling and thrilling’ Sun
£9.49
Alma Books Ltd The Adolescent: New Translation
Book SynopsisAmong Dostoevsky’s later novels, The Adolescent occupies a very special place: published three years after The Devils and five years before his final masterpiece, The Karamazov Brothers, the novel charts the story of nineteen-year-old Arkady – the illegitimate son of the landowner Versilov and the maid Sofia Andreyevna – as he struggles to find his place in society and “become a Rothschild” against the background of 1870s Russia, a nation still tethered to its old systems and values but shaken up by the new ideological currents of socialism and nihilism. Both a Bildungsroman and a novel of ideas, dealing with themes such as the relationship between fathers and sons and the role of money in modern society, The Adolescent – here presented in a brand-new translation by Dora O’Brien – shows Dostoevsky at his finest as a social commentator and observer of the workings of a young man’s mind.Trade ReviewThe Adolescent really is an unjustly neglected book. As a study of the coming of age of a confused young man, it couldn’t be bettered for capturing his mindset; and as the saga of a truly dysfunctional Russian family it can’t be faulted. * Shiny New Books *
£8.54
Vintage Publishing We The Drowned
Book SynopsisCarsten Jensen was born in 1952. He first made his name as a columnist and literary critic. As a journalist he has reported from many regions of conflict, including the Balkans and most recently, Afghanistan. His essays, novels and travel books have won numerous literary awards, including the coveted Golden Laurels and the Danish Bank Literary Prize. In 2010 he received the prestigious Olof Palme Prize, awarded for his contribution to the defence of human rights. We, the Drowned has sold more than 300,000 copies in Scandinavia alone and was voted best Danish novel of the past 25 years.Trade ReviewA magnificent addition to the canon of seafaring writing, a brilliant new reworking of the ancient theme...the pages glow with wonderfully imagined pictures... The language is all you could hope for in a sea novel: sinewy and simple, often surprisingly beautiful -- Vanora Bennett * The Times *Carsten Jensen is unquestionably one of the most exciting authors writing in Scandinavia today. I always look forward hugely to his books. He is, in my opinion, an utterly unique story-teller -- Henning MankellAn epic tale * Independent *A novel of immense authority and ambition and beauty, by a master storyteller at the height of his powers. This is a book to sail into, to explore, to get lost in, but it is also a book that brings the reader, dazzled by wonders, home to the heart from which great stories come. Meet Carsten Jensen halfway and you're spellbound -- Joseph O'ConnorImpressive... one of the more engrossing literary voyages of recent years... rich, powerful and rewarding * Financial Times *
£10.44
Oxford University Press The Confusions of Young Törless
Book SynopsisTrade ReviewThis volume is an admirable addition to the Oxford World's Classics, with some good commentary inbetween on the quality of the translation and the helpfulness of both introduction and notes. * David Midgley, Times Literary Supplement *A wonderful time to reissue this book. * Winston's Dad *
£8.54
Oxford University Press First Love and Other Stories
Book SynopsisTrade Review'Turgenev's superbly ironic story, The Diary Of A Superfluous Man, in which a dying man reflects on the futility of his life, is among the six collected in this volume, in Oxford University Press's valuable series of classic texts.' GuardianTable of ContentsThe Diary of a Superfluous Man; Mumu; Asya; First Love; King Lear of the Steppes; The Song of Triumphant Love
£9.89
Pan Macmillan Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
Book SynopsisThree adventurers set out to kill a sea monster, but all is not as it seems. Out in the vast expanse of the Pacific they find not a beast but a submarine - the Nautilus, an advanced craft captained by the enigmatic Captain Nemo. Captured and hauled aboard, they accompany him through coral reefs, shipwrecks, and ancient ruins. There they hunt sharks, and battle giant squid, not realising that the greatest danger is Nemo himself, who will stop at nothing in his quest for vengeance.Beautifully illustrated by the French painter Édouard Riou, who worked with Jules Verne on six of his novels, this Macmillan Collector's Library edition of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea also includes an afterword by author David Stuart Davies.Designed to appeal to the booklover, the Macmillan Collector's Library is a series of beautiful gift editions of much loved classic titles. Macmillan Collector's Library are books to love and treasure.
£10.44
Vintage Publishing The Redeemer: The pulse-racing sixth Harry Hole
Book SynopsisHarry Hole returns in a pulse-pounding thriller like no other. 'This book had my pulse in the red zone from start to finish' Michael Connelly A freezing December night Christmas shoppers have gathered to listen to a Salvation Army carol concert. Then a shot rings out and one of the singers falls to the floor, dead. A blood-curdling terror Detective Harry Hole and his team are called in to investigate but have little to work with - there is no immediate suspect, no weapon and no motive. But when the assassin discovers he's shot the wrong man, Harry finds his troubles have only just begun. Now the clock is ticking before he kills again*JO NESBO HAS SOLD OVER 55 MILLION BOOKS WORLDWIDE**Watch out for KILLING MOON, the new Jo Nesbo book, out now*Trade ReviewTHE NEXT STIEG LARSSON * Independent *The Redeemer rocks! Jo Nesbo is my new favorite thriller writer and Harry Hole my new hero. This book had my pulse in the red zone from start to finish * Michael Connelly *Nesbo is in a class of his own * Evening Standard *Terrific shocks, tension and atmosphere * The Times *Nesbo's fourth novel [and it] proves to be as brilliant as his other three...grimly realistic...an engrossing mystery * The Scotsman *
£8.54
Penguin Books Ltd The Aleph
Book SynopsisBorges'' stories have a deceptively simple, almost laconic style. In maddeningly ingenious stories that play with the very form of the short story, Borges returns again and again to his themes: dreams, labyrinths, mirrors, infinite libraries, the manipulations of chance, gaucho knife-fighters, transparent tigers and the elusive nature of identity itself.
£9.49
Penguin Books Ltd Chinatown
Book SynopsisA selection of the best short stories by Oh Jung-hee, one of South Korea's most influential writersIn this emblematic selection of her stories, Oh Jung-hee probes beneath the surface of seemingly quotidian lives to expose nightmarish family configurations warped by desertion, psychosis, and death. In Chinatown' a young girl living on the edge of the city's Chinese community comes of age among mundane violences, collisions with adult sexuality and the American occupation; in The Garden Party' a woman grapples with her conflicting identities of wife, mother and writer at an alcohol-fuelled gathering. Throughout a career spanning six decades, Oh Jung-hee has drawn comparisons to Alice Munro, Virginia Woolf, and Joyce Carol Oates, and is assuredly a trailblazing writer.
£10.44
Quercus Publishing City of Wonders
Book SynopsisEduardo Mendoza's classic novel about the birth of Barcelona as a world city, embodied in the rise of the ambitious and unscrupulous Onofre Bouvila"Though historical in subject matter, this story of Catalonian enterprise and Barcelonan ambition is thoroughly contemporary in spirit" Jonathan FranzenStung by the realisation that his father is a fraud and a failure, Onofre Bouvila leaves a life of rural poverty to seek his fortune in Barcelona.The year is 1888, and the Catalan capital is about to emerge from provincial obscurity to take its place amongst the great cities of the world, thanks to the upcoming Universal Exhibition. Thanks to a tip-off from his landlord's daughter, Onofre gets his big break distributing anarchist leaflets to workers preparing for the World Fair. From these humble beginnings, he branches out as a hair-tonic salesman, a burglar, a filmmaker, an arms smuggler and a political dealmaker, in a multifaceted career that brings him wealth and influence beyond his wildest dreams.But, just as Barcelona's rise makes it a haven for gangsters, crooks and spivs, vice begins to fester in Onofre's heart. And the climax to his remarkable story will come just as a second World Fair in 1929 marks the city's apotheosis.Translated from the Spanish by Nick CaistorTrade ReviewThough historical in subject matter, this story of Catalonian enterprise and Barcelonan ambition is thoroughly contemporary in spirit. -- Jonathan FranzenA splendid piacaresque novel . . . Rich in humour, irony and parody . . . Lusty and ingenious entertainment * New York Times Book Review *Rich in eccentric, violent, fantastic, and horrible incident . . . A profusion of bizarre characters, and a fair quota of entertaining digression. * The Times *A novel of great variety and scope . . . There is much to delight . . . A very considerable, and an exhilarating, achievement * Scotsman *A large book, written in picaresque style, and full of incidental pleasures. * Observer *Not since Ragtime has there been such a treasure of rascals and riches . . . Brilliant . . . Mendoza is a prodigiously inventive author. * Chicago Tribune *A major work, a great novel . . . a satirical love song and an adventurous chronicle that delivers the wonders promised in its title. * El País *One of this season's literary landmarks . . . an extravagant, amusing, fantastic, and moving fresco of Barcelona. * Vanguardia *
£10.44
Quercus Publishing An Englishman in Madrid
Book Synopsis"A funny, gripping and perfectly balanced blend of P.G. Wodehouse, Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene" Independent"Highly enjoyable read" SpectatorAnthony Whitelands, an English art historian, is invited to Madrid to value the collection of a Spanish duke. At a welcome lunch he encounters José Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder and leader of the Falange, a nationalist party whose antics are bringing the country ever closer to civil war. The paintings turn out to be worthless, but before Whitelands can leave for London the duke's daughter Paquita reveals a secret and genuine treasure, held for years in the cellars of her ancestral home. Afraid that the duke will cash in his wealth to finance the Falange, the Spanish authorities resolve to keep a close eye on the Englishman, who is also being watched by his own embassy. As Whitelands - ever a fool for a pretty face - vies with Primo de Rivera for Paquita's affections, he learns of a final interested party: Madrid is crawling with Soviet spies, and Moscow will stop at nothing to secure the hidden prize.Translated from the Spanish by Nick CaistorTrade ReviewA highly enjoyable read * Spectator *A funny, gripping and perfectly balanced blend of P.G. Wodehouse, Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene * Independent *This Englishman's excursion takes us to the very heart of Spain * Times Literary Supplement *'A funny, gripping and perfectly balanced blend of P G Wodehouse, Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene' Christian House, Independent on Sunday. * Independent on Sunday *'A highly enjoyable read [that] elegantly evokes the eccentricities of Spain's capital city' Miles Johnson, Spectator. * Spectator *'This Englishman's excursion takes us to the very heart of Spain' Michael Kerrigan, T.L.S. * TLS *
£9.99
ACA Publishing Limited My Pleasant and Tranquil Days
Book SynopsisEchoing Lu Xun's portrayal of useless scholars, Yang Zhengguang's psychodrama satirises the chauvinist who believes he is above it all. It critiques the pressure to achieve while 'laying flat' to unrealistic expectations and offers an insight into the delusions we cling to in justifying our tedious daily routines.
£11.69
Hesperus Press Ltd Exclamation Mark
Book SynopsisA civil servant stands accused of not understanding the rules of punctuation. He begins to go through the correct use of commas and semicolons before arriving at the exclamation mark, which, he realizes, in 40 years of writing, he has never used. From here he develops a bizarre and paranoid fantasy in which everyday objects transform into malevolent exclamation marks. Written when Chekhov was on the verge of becoming a literary celebrity, this is an enlightening new selection that reveals the author? s often neglected comic talents.
£9.49
Pushkin Press The Devil's Flute Murders
Book SynopsisAn ingenious and highly atmospheric classic whodunit from Japan's master of crime. Amid the rubble of post-war Tokyo, inside the grand Tsubaki house, a once-noble family is in mourning. The old viscount Tsubaki, a brooding, troubled composer, has been found dead. When the family gather for a divination to conjure the spirit of their departed patriarch, death visits the house once more, and the brilliant Kosuke Kindaichi is called in to investigate. But before he can get to the truth Kindaichi must uncover the Tsubakis' most disturbing secrets, while the gruesome murders continue... PRAISE FOR SEISHI YOKOMIZO 'The diabolically twisted plotted is top-notch' New York Times Readers will delight in the blind turns, red herrings and dubious alibis... Ingenious and compelling' Economist 'Plenty of golden age ingredients... with a truly ingenious solution' Guardian, Best New Crime NovelsTrade Review“Yokomizo at his absolute best... From the ominous opening through the brilliant final reveal, [he] ably blends suspense and fair-play detection... A classic of the genre.” --Publishers Weekly, starred review“Another fiendishly complex mystery from the master of locked room murders... Atmospheric, chilling, and structurally complex.” --CrimeReads
£9.49
Oxford University Press The Dream
Book SynopsisIn The Dream, the sixteenth novel in the Rougon-Macquart series, Zola blends mysticism and fairy tale with naturalism as an orphan girl falls in love with a nobleman.
£9.49
Vintage Publishing Out
Book SynopsisIn the Tokyo suburbs four women work the draining graveyard shift at a boxed-lunch factory. Burdened with chores and heavy debts and isolated from husbands and children, they all secretly dream of a way out of their dead-end lives. A young mother among them finally cracks and strangles her philandering, gambling husband then confesses her crime to Masako, the closest of her colleagues. For reasons of her own, Masako agrees to assist her friend and seeks the help of the other co-workers to dismember and dispose of the body. The body parts are discovered, the police start asking questions, but the women have far more dangerous enemies -a yakuza connected loan shark who discovers their secret and has a business proposition, and a ruthless nightclub owner the police are convinced is guilty of the murder. He has lost everything as a result of their crime and he is out for revenge. OUT is a psychologically taut and unflinching foray into the darkest recesses of the human sTrade ReviewDaring and disturbing, OUT is prepared to push the limits of this world - not only in violence and sex but also in human outlook… Remarkable * Los Angeles Times *OUT is a potent cocktail of urban blight, perverse feminism and vigilante justice * New York Times Book Review *A shockingly intense read * Daily Telegraph *Brings the mystery thriller to new levels of intensity and realism - OUT has great plot twists, vigour and an ending that would make Hannibal Lecter smile * Library Journal *In this top-drawer page-turner, Kirino offers a clever snapshot of her own culture...slyly amusing and compulsive * Metro *
£10.44
Faber & Faber Lullaby
Book Synopsis**SOON TO BE A MAJOR HBO SHOW STARRING NICOLE KIDMAN AND MAYA ERSKINE**THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLERA RICHARD AND JUDY PICKWINNER OF THE DEBUT NOVEL OF THE YEAR AT THE BRITISH BOOK AWARDSA SUNDAY TIMES TOP 100 NOVEL OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY''Creepy, shocking, compulsive'' The Times, BOOKS OF THE YEAR''Unnerving, addictive.'' Grazia''The smartest thriller you''ll read this year.'' IndependentThe baby is dead. It took only a few seconds.When Myriam, a brilliant lawyer, decides to return to work, she and her husband look for a nanny for their two young children. They never dreamed they would find Louise: a quiet, polite and devoted woman who sings to their children, cleans the family's chic Paris apartment, stays late without complaint and hosts enviable birthday parties. But as the couple and their nanny become more and more dependent on each other, jealousy, res
£9.49
Faber & Faber Harsh Times
Book SynopsisTHE NEW NOVEL FROM THE WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATUREA wildly enjoyable book; the 85-year-old Vargas Llosa is as sharp and mordantly funny as ever. Financial TimesGuatemala, 1954. A CIA-supported military coup topples the government. Behind this violent act is a lie passed off as truth, which forever changed the development of Latin America: that those in power encouraged the spread of Soviet communism in the Americas. Mario Vargas Llosa has written a drama on a world stage, in which some persecutors end up as victims of the very plot they helped construct. Ironic and sensual, provocative and redemptive, Harsh Times is a story of international conspiracies and conflicting interests in the time of the Cold War, the echoes of which are still felt today.
£9.49
Transworld The Trunk
Book SynopsisKim Ryeo-ryeong was born in 1971 and studied creative writing at the Seoul Institute of the Arts. She received the Munhak Dongne Children's Literature Prize in 2007 for A Seahorse Lives in My Heart, the Ma Hae-song Literary Award in 2007 for The Child Who Brought Memory, and the Changbi Prize for Young Adult Fiction in 2007 for Wandeuk (published by Changbi). She lives near Seoul. The Trunk is the inspiration for a high-profile Korean TV series to be streamed on Netflix this autumn, directed by Kim Kyu-Tae, starring Seo Hyun-li and Gong Yu.
£11.69
Sort of Books Letters from Klara: Short stories
Book SynopsisThe rich seam that is Jansson's adult prose continues with this penultimate collection of short stories, written in her seventies at the height of her Moomin fame and translated into English for the first time. In these light-footed, beautifully crafted yet disquieting stories, Jansson tells of discomfiting encounters, unlooked for connections and moments of isolation that span generations and decades. Letters From Klara proves yet again her mastery of this literary form.Trade ReviewA treat of a collection * Mail on Sunday *Delightful ... Jansson is by turn funny, melancholy and slyly mischievous - qualities brilliantly evident in the titular story * Daily Mail *
£9.49
Fitzcarraldo Editions Scenes from a Childhood — WINNER OF THE 2023
Book SynopsisScenes from a Childhood is the latest collection of stories by Jon Fosse, one of Norway's most celebrated authors and playwrights, famed for the minimalist and unsettling quality of his writing. In the title work, a loosely autobiographical narrative covers infancy to awkward adolescence, unearthing the moments of childhood that linger longest in the imagination. In 'And Then My Dog Will Come Back To Me', a haunting and dream-like novella, a dispute between neighbours escalates to an inexorable climax. Taken from various sources, the texts gathered here together for the first time demonstrate that the short story is one of the recurrent modes of Fosse's imagination, and occasions some of his greatest works.Trade Review‘The Beckett of the twenty-first century.’ — Le Monde‘Jon Fosse is a major European writer.’ — Karl Ove Knausgaard, author of My Struggle‘Jon Fosse is less well-known in America than some other Norwegian novelists, but revered in Norway – winner of every prize, a leading Nobel contender. I think of the four elder statesmen of Norwegian letters as a bit like the Beatles: Per Petterson is the solid, always dependable Ringo; Dag Solstad is John, the experimentalist, the ideas man; Karl Ove Knausgaard is Paul, the cute one; and Fosse is George, the quiet one, mystical, spiritual, probably the best craftsman of them all... His writing is pure poetry.’ — Paris Review, from an essay by the translator‘Fosse has been compared to Ibsen and to Beckett, and it is easy to see his work as Ibsen stripped down to its emotional essentials. But it is much more. For one thing, it has a fierce poetic simplicity.’ — New York Times‘With its heavy silences and splintered dialogue, his work has reminded some of Beckett, others of Pinter.’ — Guardian‘Fosse’s prose ... builds out of an ambiguity and sparseness and moves with a slow poetic intensity.... The collection has all the hallmarks of Fosse’s signature brooding manner where lyrical precision is used to paint unmoored psyches. An accumulation of moments when our essential emotions come into conflict with experience, Scenes from a Childhood is a welcome – if overdue – introduction to a singular literary voice.’ — Tank‘Fosse writes about the complexity and danger of the bleak Norwegian countryside as well as he writes about the passage of time through a life. In choosing to mostly focus on pieces about childhood, Searls has been able to show an impressive side to Fosse, because – in my experience at least – writing engaging prose about childhood trips up many otherwise competent writers.... Fosse understands that a child’s mind is not merely the mind of an ignorant adult, it is a different form of consciousness entirely: more curious, more optimistic, less scared.... There are portraits of great happiness, great pleasure and great joy in Scenes From A Childhood.’ — Berfrois
£10.44
Daunt Books Our Lady of the Nile
Book Synopsis
£9.49
V & Q Books A Light Still Burns: Part 3 of the Anatolian
Book Synopsis"There are three ways to face life: put up with it, fight or flee." After eight years in Turkey, Gul leaves her native Anatolia and returns to Germany. Reunited with her husband Fuat, she observes life there from the margins. As age gives her ever deeper insight, she sees society change rapidly, and yet her ability to connect to the people around her remains constant. Gul's life is shaped by the melancholy of separation, but with her warm-hearted and accepting outlook she has learned to endure homesickness and longing. Full of emotions and poetry but told without sentimentality, Selim OEzdogan's account of Gul's journey is a tender and moving novel about home, cultural identity and a life between two worlds. "Selim Oezdogan's latest novel is an affectionate testament to a whole generation of women who are often overlooked. Gul has many names and many faces." Steffen Radlmaier, Nurnberger Nachrichten "A luminous conclusion to a trilogy that has no equal in any language. Through the story of one woman who insists, against the odds, on meeting the world with an open heart, it brings grace and dignity to the many unsung millions whose lives have followed the same zigzagging paths between Turkey and Germany over three generations." Maureen Freely, author of Sailing Through Byzantium and translator of Orhan PamukTrade Review"Anchored in the circumstances of this century and yet timeless, this is the story of exiles and homecomings, of silences and distances and loneliness but with a hopefulness at its heart. Above all it is a story about women and age: an old woman's careful, thoughtful, analytic eye reflecting on motherhood, friendship, marriage, survival. It is about pepper paste and aubergines and goat meat and cooking and feeding people and finding the right ingredients in a foreign place. It is about all the small daily worries of a woman which can be read as all the great difficulties of finding ourselves a place in the world that feels like home. This book is full of wisdom." Jane Campbell, author of Cat Brushing
£11.69
Alma Books Ltd The Fatal Eggs
Book SynopsisProfessor Persikov, an eccentric zoologist, stumbles upon a new light ray that accelerates growth and reproduction rates in living organisms. In the wake of a plague that has decimated the country's poultry stocks, Persikov's discovery is exploited as a means to correct the problem. As foreign agents, the state and the Soviet media all seize upon the red ray, matters get out of hand... Set in 1928 but written four years earlier, during Stalin's rise to power, The Fatal Eggs is both an early piece of science fiction reminiscent of H.G. Wells and a biting, brilliant satire on the consequences of the abuse of power and knowledge.Trade ReviewThe exuberance of it... has to enliven the reader, and make us laugh. -- Doris Lessing Bulgakov was not merely a brilliant observer of what was going on around him, but had an uncanny ability to pick out the particular manifestations of folly and discord which would set the tone of the era to follow. * The Guardian * Cockrell's self-effacing, fluent prose restores the elegant irony of the original, while rising to the challenge of Bulgakov's occasionally abstruse medical lexicon. * TLS *
£7.59
And Other Stories The Iliac Crest
Book SynopsisOn a dark and stormy night, an unnamed narrator is visited by two women: one a former lover, the other a stranger. They ruthlessly question their host and claim to know his greatest secret: that he is, in fact, a woman. In increasingly desperate attempts to defend his masculinity, perplexed by the stranger’s dubious claims to be the writer Amparo Dávila, he finds himself spiralling deeper into a haunted past that may or may not be his own. This surreal novel enfolds a masterful exploration of gender in taut, atmospheric mystery.Trade Review`A key work of Mexican literature.’ Elena Poniatowska ---------- `An intelligent, beautiful story about bodies disguised as a story about language disguised as a story about night terrors. Cristina Rivera Garza does not respect what is expected of a writer, of a novel, of language. She is an agitator.’ Yuri Herrera --------- `Warning: Cristina Rivera Garza is an explosive writer yet to be fully accounted for in English. An insubordinate stylist, a skilled creator of atmospheric and haunting language, The Iliac Crest is a willfully queer piece where the workings of her wild imagination destabilize everything.’ Lina Meruane ---------- `Like the ocean itself, Cristina Rivera Garza writes a world where borders shift and dissolve. In the curves of the fantastic, the highest realism is born. This world is weird. This world is so deeply true. I love this wholly perfect book.’ Samantha Hunt
£10.46
Penguin Books Ltd The Sorrows of Young Werther
Book SynopsisA key work in the German ''Sturm und Drang'' movement, Johann Goethe''s autobiographical epistolary novel The Sorrows of Young Werther is a defining moment in early Romanticism, which has influenced writers from Mary Shelley to Thomas Mann. This Penguin Classics edition is translated from with an introduction by Michael Hulse.Visiting an idyllic German village, Werther, a sensitive young man, meets and falls in love with sweet-natured Charlotte. Although he realises that she is to marry Albert, he is unable to subdue his passion and his infatuation torments him to the point of despair. The first great ''confessional'' novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther draws both on Goethe''s own unrequited love for Charlotte Buff and on the death of his friend Karl Wilhelm Jerusalem. The book was an immediate success, and a cult rapidly grew up around it, resulting in numerous imitations as well as violent criticism and suppression on the grounds of its apparent support of suicide. Goethe''s sensitive exploration of the mind of an artist at odds with society and ill-equipped to cope with life is now considered the first great tragic novel of European literature.This edition includes notes and an introduction by Michael Hulse, who explores the origins of the novel in the author''s life and examines its impact on European culture.Johann Wolfgang Goethe (1749-1832) was born in Frankfurt, Germany. Although he directed the German State Theatre, dabbled in the occult and worked on scientific theories in evolutionary botany, Goethe is best remembered for his great works The Sorrows of Young Werther and Faust, and his part in the 18th century ''Sturm and Drang'' movement.If you enjoyed The Sorrows of Young Werther, you might like Stendhal''s Love, also published in Penguin Classics.
£8.54
Pushkin Children's Books The Murderer's Ape
Book SynopsisAN OBSERVER, GUARDIAN, TELEGRAPH, TIMES, SUNDAY TIMES and BOOKTRUST BOOK OF THE YEAR A Waterstones Children's Book of the Month 'I don't know when I last read a book with such pure and unalloyed pleasure. It's ingenious, it's moving, it's charming, it's beautiful, it's exciting, and most importantly the characters are people I feel I know like old friends' - Philip Pullman Sally Jones is not only a loyal friend, she's an extraordinary individual. In overalls or in a maharaja's turban, this unique gorilla moves among humans without speaking but understanding everything. She and the Chief are devoted comrades who operate a cargo boat. A job they are offered pays big bucks, but the deal ends badly, and the Chief is falsely convicted of murder. For Sally Jones this is the start of a harrowing quest for survival and to clear the Chief's name. Powerful forces are working against her, and they will do anything to protect their secrets.
£9.49
Alma Books Ltd Exercises in Style
Book SynopsisOn a crowded bus at midday, the narrator observes one man accusing another of jostling him deliberately. When a seat is vacated, the first man takes it. Later, in another part of town, the man is spotted again, while being advised by a friend to have another button sewn onto his overcoat. Exercises in Style retells this apparently unremarkable tale ninety-nine times, employing a variety of styles, ranging from sonnet to cockney to mathematical formula. Too funny to be merely a pedantic thesis, this virtuoso set of themes and variations is a linguistic rustremover, a guide to literary forms and a demonstration of imagery and inventiveness.Trade ReviewWitty, playful, ingenious, it manages to transcend its own sophistication by a sort of verbal slapstick which Miss Wright translated into pure Groucho Marxism. * The Guardian * Midway between Lewis Carroll and Jacques Derrida, in a deliriously witty dimension of its own, lies Queneau's Exercises in Style... Barbara Wright's dazzling translation matches this oddball classic step by step, pun by pun. * The Independent * A pointless anecdote told in 99 different ways, or a work of genius in a brilliant translation by Barbara Wright. In fact it's both. Endlessly fascinating and very funny. -- Philip Pullman I've loved Exercises in Style for years. This translation is impeccable, extraordinary. -- Philip Pullman
£7.59
Vintage Publishing Stalingrad
Book Synopsis'One of the great novels of the 20th century' ObserverIn April 1942, Hitler and Mussolini plan the huge offensive on the Eastern Front that will culminate in the greatest battle in human history.Hundreds of miles away, Pyotr Vavilov receives his call-up papers and spends a final night with his wife and children in the hut that is his home. As war approaches, the Shaposhnikov family gathers for a meal: despite her age, Alexandra will soon become a refugee; Tolya will enlist in the reserves; Vera, a nurse, will fall in love with a wounded pilot; and Viktor Shtrum will receive a letter from his doomed mother which will haunt him forever.The war will consume the lives of a huge cast of characters - lives which express Grossman's grand themes of the nation and the individual, nature's beauty and war's cruelty, love and separation.For months, Soviet forces are driven back inexorably by the German advance eastward and eventually Stalingrad is all that remains between the invaders and victory. The city stands on a cliff top by the Volga River. The battle for Stalingrad - a maelstrom of violence and firepower - will reduce it to ruins. But it will also be the cradle of a new sense of hope.Stalingrad is a magnificent novel not only of war but of all human life: its subjects are mothers and daughters, husbands and brothers, generals, nurses, political officers, steelworkers, tractor girls. It is tender, epic, and a testament to the power of the human spirit.'You will not only discover that you love his characters and want to stay with them - that you need them in your life as much as you need your own family and loved ones - but that at the end... you will want to read it again' Daily Telegraph THE PREQUEL TO LIFE AND FATE NOW AVAILABLE IN ENGLISH FOR THE FIRST TIME, STALINGRAD IS A SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER AND NOW A MAJOR RADIO 4 DRAMAWINNER OF MODERN LANGUAGE ASSOCIATION "LOIS ROTH AWARD" FOR TRANSLATIONS FROM ANY LANGUAGETrade ReviewOne needs time and patience to read Stalingrad, but it is worth it. Moving majestically from Berlin to Moscow to the boundless Kazakh steppe… A multitude of lives and fates are played out against a vast panoramic history * Evening Standard, *Book of the Week* *If you have read Grossman before, you will already very likely know that you urgently want to read Stalingrad. If you haven’t, I can only tell you that when you do read this novel, you will not only discover that you love his characters and want to stay with them – that you need them in your life as much as you need your own family and loved ones – but that at the end, despite having finished an 892-page novel, you want to read it again * Daily Telegraph *This is a big event… [Stalingrad] gives voice to a dizzying array of experiences… [you] feel as though you are there, wandering through those devastated streets among the starving, dead, and mad * Daily Mail *A dazzling prequel… His descriptions of battle in an industrial age are some of the most vivid ever written… Stalingrad is Life and Fate’s equal. It is, arguable, the richer book – shot through with human stories and a sense of life’s beauty and fragility * Observer *Few works of literature since Homer can match the piercing, unshakably humane gaze that Grossman turns on the haggard face of war * The Economist *
£12.34
Penguin Books Ltd Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk And Other Stories
Book SynopsisNikolai Semyonovich Leskov was born in 1831 in Gorokhovo, Oryol Province and was orphaned early. In 1860 he became a journalist and moved to Petersburg where he published his first story. He subsequently wrote a number of folk legends and Christmas tales, along with a few anti-nihilistic novels which resulted in isolation from the literary circles of his day. He died in 1895.David McDuff is a translator of Russian and Nordic literature. His translations of nineteenth- and twentieth-century Russian prose classics (including works by Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Bely and Babel) are published by Penguin.
£11.69
Penguin Books Ltd Dandelions
Book SynopsisThe exquisite last novel from Nobel Prize-winning author Yasunari KawabataIneko has lost the ability to see things. At first it was a ping-pong ball, then it was her fiancé. The doctors call it ''body blindness'', and she is placed in a psychiatric clinic to recover. As Ineko''s mother and fiancé walk along the riverbank after visiting time, they wonder: is her condition a form of madness - or an expression of love? Exploring the distance between us, and what we say without words, Kawabata''s transcendent final novel is the last word from a master of Japanese literature. ''Lusciously peculiar'' Paris ReviewTrade ReviewYasunari Kawabata's lusciously peculiar novel Dandelions was unfinished when he took his life in 1972. It's a story of love and loss and mania, told in sparse, arresting prose * Paris Review *Kawabata's novels are among the most affecting and original works of our time -- New York Times Book ReviewThere are few other writers who could invoke such a lasting memory of a single image with so few words. * San Francisco Chronicle *A literary habitat like no other?quietly devastating fiction. Behind a lyrical and understated surface, chaotic passions pulse * The Independent *
£8.54
Dedalus Ltd Bruges-la-Morte: and The Death Throes of Towns
Book Synopsis
£11.78
