Search results for ""istros books""
Istros Books The Olcinium Trilogy
Olcinium, the Latin name for present-day Ulcinj, is one of the oldest settlements on the Adriatic coast and ruled in turn by the Illyrians, Romans, Byzantines and Ottomans, as well as being an important Venetian port and a centre for the slave trade. It was also home to Fra Dolcino, a medieval heretic who announced the return of the Messiah and Sabbatai Zevi, a Renaissance cabalist who maintained that he was the Messiah and according to legend left behind sacred writings, The Book of Return: Both make appearances in this trilogy.The Olcinium Trilogy brings together three of Nikolaidis’ short novels: The Son, The Coming and Till Kingdom Come, which together encompass an apocalyptic vision of this ancient town; where mystics have prophesized, regimes plotted against their citizenry and ordinary people resorted to crime and deceit in order to survive. Like his literary hero, Thomas Bernhard, Nikolaids’ prose is precise and bitingly funny and his protagonists hopeless misanthropes: from the local sleuth who sacrifices truth for the sake of telling his clients the stories they want to hear to the local reporter who discovers that his own past was concocted by Yugoslav secret services and enters a state of time-travelling paranoia.
£11.99
Istros Books Yugoslavia, My Fatherland
When Vladan Borojevic googles the name of his father Nedeljko, a former officer in the Yugoslav People's Army, supposedly killed in the civil war after the decay of Yugoslavia, he unexpectedly discovers a dark family secret which recollects the events of 1991 when he first heard the military term deployment and his idyllic childhood came to a sudden end. Seventeen years later Vladan's discovery that he is the son of a fugitive war criminal sends him off on a journey round the Balkans to find his elusive father where he also finds out how the falling apart of his family is closely linked with the disintegration of the world they used to live in. The story of the Borojevic family strings and juxtaposes images of the Balkans past and present, but mainly deals with the tragic fates of people who managed to avoid the bombs, but were unable to escape the war.
£12.99
Istros Books Sun Alley
Sal, the protagonist of "Sun Alley," is an exceptionally intelligent 12-year-old boy, experiencing his first love. One summer afternoon, on his way to see his girlfriend Emi, he is caught in a rain shower and shelters in the hallway of a block of flats. Led by a strong odor, he goes down into the basement, where he comes upon the corpse of a young and very beautiful woman. Little by little, Sal will attempt to discover the mystery of this body and, at the same time, will pursue his amorous relationship with Emi; a strange liaison which unfolds in parallel with the adulterous affair of an adult couple whose path Sal repeatedly crosses. As his love story with Emi evolves, Sal tries his best to hide it, not only from the cynical eyes of his friends in the neighborhood, but also from his parents whose intervention might well shatter his bliss thereby developing a veritably adulterous mindset. The connections between adults and the two children, on the one hand, and the dead body discovered by Sal on the other, are far deeper and more complicated than they may at first seem. "Sun Alley "is a novel about the roots of adultery and the destiny of an exceptional young boy who, thanks to his gifts, has the power to see visions."
£17.52
Istros Books Life Begins on Friday
A young man is found lying unconscious on the outskirts of Bucharest. No one knows who he is and everyone has a different theory about how he got there. The stories of the various characters unfold, each closely interwoven with the next, and outlining the features of what ultimately turns out to be the most important and most powerful character of all: the city of Bucharest itself. The novel covers the last 13 days of 1897 and culminates in a beautiful tableau of the future as imagined by the different characters. We might, in fact, say that it is we who inhabit their future. And so too does Dan Cretu, alias Dan Kretzu, the present-day journalist hurled back in time by some mysterious process for just long enough to allow us a wonderful glimpse into a remote, almost forgotten world, but one still very much alive in our hearts.
£12.99
Istros Books Our Man in Iraq
A local journalist sends a distant relative to report on the war in Iraq, while he stays at home to sort out his love life and his professional career - all to varying degrees of success. As time goes on, things begin to unravel and he ends up having to fake his missing cousin's reports while struggling to hold on to his actress girlfriend. Our Man in Iraq is a take on the Iraqi conflict from the other side of Europe, where politics and nepotism collide and the confusing aftereffects of the recent Yugoslav wars mix with the joys and trials of modern life.With an introduction by Tim Judah of The Economist.'Robert Perisic is a light bright with intelligence and twinkling with irony, flashing us the news that postwar Croatia not only endures but matters.' Jonathan Franzen'Robert Perisic depicts, with acerbic wit, a class of urban elites who are trying to reconcile their nineties rebellion with the reality of present-day Croatia. . . . The characters' snide remarks could easily sound cynical but the novel has a levity informed by the sense of social fluidity that comes with democracy.' The New YorkerThis book is also available as a eBook. Buy it from Amazon here.
£8.23
Istros Books Catherine the Great and the Small
Catharine's trajectory in life is accompanied by failures in love, family traumas and an incredible romance with handsome Sinisa. The novel takes us through turbulent times in the Balkan region, from the eighties to the present day, portraying growing up in the twilight of communism, and giving intimate insights into all that happened to the region after that. Carefully crafted characters and masterful, dynamic storytelling place Catherine the Great and the Small in the company of the very best of novels, which speak about the reality of their geographic setting and are remembered for their convincing, strong, maladjusted characters. Catherine is certainly one of them: a powerful female voice seeking her place within her family, among friends, in the cities she lives in, and constructing her unique identity as a daughter, granddaughter, friend, mistress, wife and a mother.
£10.99
Istros Books Fleeting Snow
Pavel Vilikovský’s novella Fleeting Snow (Letmý sneh, 2014), depicts the gradual loss of memory of the narrator’s wife. The narrator reminisces about his past life with his wife and muses on issues ranging from human nature and the soul, to names and the phonetics of Slovak and indigenous American Indian languages, in an informal, humorous style whose lightness of touch belies the seriousness of his themes. The book’s title refers to its recurring central motif, an avalanche whose inexorable descent cannot be stopped once the critical mass of snow has begun to roll, echoing the unstoppable process of memory loss. Five themes or storylines, intertwined in passages of varying lengths, are labelled with letters of the alphabet and numbers in a playful allusion to scholarly works and musical compositions.
£9.99
Istros Books Doppelganger
Doppelganger consists of two stories that skillfully revisit the question of "doubles" (famously explored by Stevenson, Dostoyevsky and others), and how an individual is perpetually caught between their own beliefs and those imposed on them by society. `Arthur and Isabella' is a story of the relationship between two elderly people who meet on New Year's Eve - a romantic encounter which turns into a grotesque portrayal of the loneliness of old age. The second story `Pupi' - a strange mirror of the first - centres on the life of a man who ends up on the streets and associates only with street-sellers the rhinoceroses in the zoo. Together these tales crate the highly original atmosphere that Drndic t is famous for in all her works.
£9.99
Istros Books Balkan Bombshells: Contemporary Women's Writing from Serbia and Montenegro
A collection to whet the appetite of anyone wishing to learn more about a region rich in history, folklore and (her)stories. Telling it like a woman does not mean literature for women only: it provides an insight into half of humanity, a window onto the lives of citizens who work, love and develop their inner lives. This collection brings together the voices of a wide selection of prize-winning and established authors
£10.99
Istros Books Blind Man
The main character and narrator of Blind Man is a successful book editor and critic with severely impaired vison, although he has never had much to do with the visually impaired community and doesn't really feel like he is one of them. But when he is offered a chance to enter the world of politics, he is "blinded" by the lure of power, and this easy-going, level-headed husband and soon-to-be father gradually turns into a self-absorbed careerist. Author Mitja Cander, without pontificating and with a measured dose of humour, paints a critical, unsparing portrait of a small European country and through it a convincing satire on the psychological state of contemporary European society. What, or who, do we still believe in today, and who should we trust? Politicians, apparatchiks, the media? Speeches laden with buzzwords and grandiose promises break down the flimsy facade, as the protagonist's own insecurity suggests that things are not always what they seem. In the end, social blindness is worse than any physical impairment, and worst of all is to be blinded by your own ego.
£9.99
Istros Books Absolution
It's Carnival time 2012, and the Slovenian city of Maribor is European Capital of Culture. In an attempt to maximize profit, local politicians and showman peddle every possible art form. Amidst the hype, dramatist Adam Bely and Cuban-Austrian journalist Rosa Portero pursue a secret mission: to track down and overthrow the sinister octopus of 13 selected persons that seems to be in control. On the way, they encounter a variety of important citizens, all entangled in a web of corruption and lies. In the tradition of Bulgakov, Gogol and Kafka Ales Steger lets the forces of good and evil collide in this grandiose literary thriller. This is a debut novel filled with striking personae, haunting images and a grotesque plot. It proves, in the end, to be a journey into the heart of a European darkness.
£9.99