Category: EUROPEAN FICTION

The people in the photo by Hélène Gestern

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the-people-in-the-photo

The people in the photo by Hélène Gestern

French fiction

Original title – Eux sur la photo

Translation by Emily Boyce and Ros Schwartz

Source – review copy

Hélène Gestern is a French writer she is based in Nancy in France is a teacher and researcher at a laboratory studying linguistics   .She is also on the editorial committee of a literary review magazine dedicate to autobiographical writing .Her interest are photography and cats .This is her first book to be translated to English.

                                                              Ashford ,25 march 2007

Madame / Monsieur

I have only just read your advertisement ref 248 .22o in the Libération of 12 February

I believe I may have some information concerning the person you are inquiring about :I am convinced it is my father , who often used to spend his summers in Interlaken .I am enclosing the photocopy of his Geneva Tennis club membership card from the 1960’s ,which I have found among his papers .You will see his photograph on it

Could you tell me how you obtained his name and why you are seeking information about him

Yours faithfully

S.Crusten

The first letter to Hélène from Stéphane that starts their journey .

 

The people in the photo is an epistolary novel .The book starts when    Hélène an archivist discovers a photo of her late  mother and two men the photo was taken in 1971 at a tennis tournament in Interlaken .Armed with this info she puts an advert in the French newspaper Libération with the names on the back of the photo and is shocked when she gets a reply from Stéphane a swiss biologist that is based in Kent ,he believes it is his father is one of the two men with Hélène’s late mother .This is the basis of the book the letters that follow try to find out what happened between the parents at the time ,try to get to the bottom of how Hélène’s mother died .

                                                    Paris , 17 Febuary (email)

Dear Stéphane

As if you had to ask ! I will yes ,as molly bloom would say , come with you to Geneva .And we can stop off to see Jean on the way back : I’m dying to meet him .Did the nurse tell you exactly what happened ?

I’ll be waiting for you at the flat on Friday .You know the way ,but you’ll need th new magic number b220

A tender kiss

Hélène

AS you see they draw closer over the course of a year of writing to each other .

Now the book is an exploration of find out the secrets that can be kept from kids by their parents .The two main characters each in turn discover more about their parents than they wanted .The choosing of the epistolary form shows that even given the change from letters to e mails it still shows how the tension can be built from mail to mail as these two uncover the long-lost secrets of the past .Each some how finds out where they came from ,discover what problems can happen when there parents may have had a liaison in the past and what does this mean for the two of them now because although they have been drawn together by chance they actually start to like each other as the go on the journey of discovery .Photos play an important part in the book Hélène Gestern brings the pictures in this book to life in the prose as we see the family snaps of the two pass and the past come alive .This is one for loves of family secrets it is full of them ,loves of photos and if you are like me and see a picture and build your own narrative around it this is one for you ,how often have you found or seen a picture and wonder what happened then and what happened at the time ,also a book for the fan of the epistolary form .I will soon have a q&a with Hélène Gestern .

Have you a favourite epistolary novel ?

Ekaterini by Marija Knežević,

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Ekaterini by Marija Knežević,

Serbian fiction

Original title –  Ekaterini

Translator – Will Firth

Source – review copy

Well another book from last years backlog of read and unreviewed books as I try to clear the backlog, so  I get to another of the Istros books Best Balkan book 2013 ,this time it is the Serbian writer Marija Knežević she studied at Belgrade university and the in the US ,worked in Serbian radio ,she has published a number of books in various styles of writing poetry ,essay ,short fiction and novels .She was included in the best european fiction 2012 for Serbia .She has also won a number of book prizes in Serbia .

Where is he ? Why is he late ? All right , I always come a little early just in case , but he should have passed by already ,like every other day .How did he look ? Is he going to come ? Is he going to give me a piece of chocolate today too ?

The start of a chapter grandmother when Ekaterini was waiting for her fathers return from the great war .

Well Ekaterini is a novel about women in the Balkans ,about moving through places ,about longing ,about a quest to return home .As you see a complex book that deals with one women journey from Greece to Yugoslavia as it was then and the history of the 20th century she saw .The woman is Ekaterini the title of the book she is as Greek women that falls in love with a man from what is now Serbia and follows him home to Belgrade and she makes a life with him this is before the second world war ,the we see how her and her two young daughters cope during the second world war .The change fortunes as the war goes one way and the another the two leaders Hitler and Stalin ,the post war period of Socialism and of course the great leader of Yugoslavia Tito then post Tito to the falling apart of Yugoslavia .Ekaterini always dreams through out her life of returning to her home in Thessalonike .The story is told by her granddaughter who greatly admired her grandmother .

Visiting her grave is like going for a walk for me .They say Lesce cemetery is a real “fresh air -spa” .Sure enough ,I alway come back from the cemetery feeling refreshed ,in a mood such as only intoxication with oxygen can bring

Ekaterini granddaughter the unnamed narrator of the book visiting the grandmothers grave .

Well the book is described as the reverse  story of the myth  Odysseus of course instead of Odysseus going and fighting in the wars it is a female Ekaterini a modern-day take on Penelope  that takes the journey not to fight but to show the other side of a conflict and that is the home life ,what is it like to bring up a family against this backdrop ? what is it like to be a women instead of a man and miss your homeland .I love the fact that Susan the publisher of Istros books keeps turning up gems like this one .Yet another book that for me shows the importance of books in translation .They take you to another place ,see the world through another eyes and like this can twist what we known as Greek myth into a greater myth of the Balkans and switching what was the male narrative of the original to a modern female narrative .

Have you a book you’ve enjoyed that is a modern  retelling of a  myth ?

The castle of of whisper by Carole Martinez

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The Castle of Whispers

The castle of Whisper by Carole Martinez

French fiction

Original title – Du domaine des murmures

Translator – Howard Curtis

Source – review copy

Carole Martinez is a rising star of historic fiction in France this is her second novel .She is a middle school teacher ,she began writing during maternity leave nine years ago .This her second novel won the Goncourt Lyceens in 2011 ,previous winners are Phillippe  Claude and Andrei Makine .The prize sees twelve books read by 2000 students and they choose the one they like .

in the year 1187 , Esclarmonde ,damsel of the whisper ,resolves to live as an anchoress at Hautepierre , confined until her death to the sealed cell built for her by her father against the walls of the chapel that he erected on his lands in honour of Saint Agnes ,who was martyred at the age of thirteen for having accepted no other bridegroom than christ

How esclarmonde end up a damsel of whispers .

The castle of whisper is set in 12th century France ,a young women  ,the fifteen year old Esclarmonde is due to marry a rather unworthy Knight that has a wandering eye .She decides to turn her back on this marriage and join the Church much to her fathers dismay and she  becomes a mistress of Christ .She chooses to use her dowry for her entry to the church  instead of her marriage and builds a stone chapel where she entombed herself  in a cell ,the years pass and she can only contact the world via a small gap .She has become a link between the world of now and the dead ,her words tell what may happen ,the whispers of this place change the outside world .A world gripped in violence and the crusades are taking part .

My father had not yet put in an appearance outside my cell .In the autumn ,he had taken a second wife ,a young childless widow not much older than myself .whom I had often glimpsed since her arrival at the castle .her name was Douce ,and she smiled at me whenever she passed the maple .

What will the new stepmother bring into Esclarmonde life ?

I have struggle with historic fiction in the past ,I must have been the only person not too enjoy wolf hall ,so it was with nerves I decided to read this as it was another book set in the middle ages .But was surprised to find I liked it Martinez is a poetic writer ,she shows the transformation of the young girl to a woman in the walls of a church .I enjoyed the series on the TV in the  eighties Robin Hood ,which like this novel drift at times into the world of mysticism ,Esclarmonde and her castle of whispers are a French take on the same themes touched in the TV series ,people tended to believe in the other world ,worlds more than they do now .Gabriel Garcia Marquez is mentioned on the back cover  from a review ,I agree she has the same way of making the extraordinary seem less so the world isn’t so surreal as Marquez does in his books .The castle of whispers is about the power of men and women to battle the world in different ways one with love the other with violence .How faith can make people change and grow .

Do you have a favourite historic writer ?

The infatuations by Javier Marias

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the infatuations

The infatuations by Javier Marias

Spanish literature

Orginial title – Los enamoramientos

Translator – Margaret Jull Costa

Source – library book

I have read two other Marias before this one ,I reviewed while the women are sleeping a couple of years ago and late last year read a heart so white ,I enjoyed both and have before that i have tried to read the huge your face tomorrow trilogy but never got to it as I never get chance to have the library books out long enough to get to them .But after hearing this mentioned as one of the favourite books of last year by Three percent podcast .I decided with the Independent foreign fiction prize looming in the background I review this before a heart so white .Javier Marias has been writing for forty years he started translating Dracula scripts for his uncle a well-known Spanish film director the infatuations was his latest book in Spanish published in 2011 in there .

The last time I saw Miguel Desvern or Deverne was also the last time that his wife , Luisa saw him ,which I ,on the other hand was a preson he had never met , a woman with whom he had never exchanged so much as a single word .I didn’t even know his name ,or only when it was too late

The opening lines of the book ,now doesn’t that draw you in?

 

I had been meaning to try this book , since it came out  last year partly due to the great black and white cover ,I’m not a huge one for mentioning covers but this one is a just come and look and read me cover ,anyway back to the book it the story of a women Maria Dolz  who works in publishing ,she sits every morning in a cafe and watches a young couple that also frequent the  same cafe ,she is an imaginative person and dreams about these two then one day she finds out the husband of the couple has died  after seeing a picture of a man who has been stabbed in a newspaper .This draws her into a sort of mystery and what is the wife doing ,when she turns up with some kids and they are fetch by another man .What is happening ? why did he die ,who is the new man ?

“Once the sentence had been  heard ,it was Athos who turned to her and ,as master of ceremonies , said : “Anne de Brueil , countess de la fere , Milady de Winter ,your crimes have weried men on earth and god in heaven .

one of many literary links in the story ,Maria does work in publishing .

I love Marias and will read all his books translated over time ,if there is a reading version of slow cooking he is it the prose he writes isn’t flashy ,the action plot isn’t a hurtling train no this is like a slow cook the senses ,mind is seeped slowly and gently into finding out what had happened to the couple .We discover that what Maria saw and thought she saw isn’t really what she saw .I was reminded of the way Maria gets drawn into this Murder and the web surrounding of the Woody Allen film Manhattan Murder mystery which saw a character played by Diane keaton sees her neighbour maybe kill his wife ,this book remind me of the fumbling into a deeper mystery .I also loved the way he used the character of my lady from the three musketeers as someone to compare the wife too .    We see a lot about life ,death and what drives people. I loved his style of writing ,yet again his books are like a slow drift down the river ,there is no hurrying in his writing it needs to be savoured .

A meal in Winter by Hubert Mingarelli

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a-meal-in-winter

A meal in Winter by Hubert Mingarelli

French fiction

Orginal title – Un repas en hiver

Translator -Sam Taylor

Source – review copy

Hubert Mingarelli is a French writer ,he left school at 17 joined the navy and saw the world travelling around the Mediterranean and pacific .He took up writing in the late 1980’s and published his first book in 1992 .A meal in winter is his first book to be translated into English  .He won the Prix Médicis a major French lit prize in 2003 for an earlier book .

As usual , he gave us what we asked for ,and we left the next morning – Emmerich Bauer and myself ,We went at dawn before the first shootings .That meant missing breakfast ,but also meant not facing Graaf who would be filed with hatred we went over his head .

The three set off after getting the ok

I read this book one evening last November and was struck by it’s sheer power in the fact it is a simple story but with lots of power on the moral nature of man .The book has just five main characters they are three Nazi solders sent by their commander  not Lt Graff  there intimidate boss , to fetch a runaway Jewish boy / young man and a Pole they meet whilst doing this . The story starts when the three solder are sent out in the deep winter to recapture an escape Jew and deal with him as they see fit .The man has escaped but due to the weather and the place they are ,he hasn’t got to far but far enough for them all to get stuck , and is recaptured by the three .they then decide to take shelter and seek something to eat at the farm house ,then they are joined by a  very anti Semitic Pole .This simple meal and what happens during it may change the five men caught in the very deep winter of middle Europe .Each questions the actions .

The Pole seeming unwilling to stop staring at the Jew and his peeled-back lips expressed a sort of satisfaction .Bauer demanded .”what’s got into you ? ”

The Pole ,looking at Bauer ,quickly said a few words before his gaze swung back to the storeroom .And then he spoke in the universal language of Malice ,his head nodding maliciously .

The Pole shows his colours to the three men .

This book is short as I said at 138 pages long and not the biggest hardback ,but for what it lacks in size and length it makes up for in style ,this book is from the pen of a talented writer sparse is the story but deep as well .We see how the soldier did this to escape shooting ,the Jewish boy is almost like a mute witness but at the centre of it all an unnamed young man that is the target of the Pole when he arrives in the narrative .But for the soldier catching him is easier than killing others which is what they had to do .Moral questions are ask by all what forms values like a lot books that maybe focus on the German side of the conflict you see the different values of the men and when faced with someone truly anti Semitic ,they begin to question there own views .I review another book from this time yesterday from Hanna krall I felt these two actually suited being reviewed in consecutive days different styles of writing this sparse to the point no drifting the other drifting and full of the war ,this is just five people .

Do you like sparse narrative books when done well ?

Chasing the king of hearts by Hanna Krall

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Chasing the king of heart by Hanna Krall

Polish fiction

Original title – Król kier znów na wylocie

Translator –  PhilipBoehm

Source – Review copy

Hanna Krall is a polish writer born in 1935 in Warsaw to a Jewish family she survived the second world war in hiding ,but lost many member of her own family .After the war she graduated in Journalism and started working for the polish magazine life of Warsaw and moved around working a a literary manager ,before becoming a novel writer in the 1980’s since then she has written nearly twenty years .this book was published too much acclaim in 2006 in Poland .

She’s right ,too there he is ,second row ,first card on the right – the king of hearts next to him the six of hearts ,which means a trip .Of course those three of spades are a bad sign .Terenia explains ,but even that’s not so tragic : you should be getting news any day

from chapter with title of the book and also a card reading of what may happen to Izolda .

Chasing the king of hearts is a story set during the second world war story ,it is a Jewish second world war story ,it is a jewish second world story of what happened to many Polish and other Jewish people during the war .This book is about one women surviving the horrors of that time ,this book is her story Izolda Regenberg .Her story as told in this book is a collection of vignettes   editorial piece ,articles the novel is a series of glimpses into Izolda and her life ,her great husband Shayek ,we follow them and all the people around her  in her life as they enter the ghetto .We glimpse the ever opening doors of horrors at the war and what it has brought them too .Izolda hides but ends up in many a tight corner as she tries to escape from the war and the Nazis ,but she ends up getting caught up and ends up in Auschwitz but will he love save the day as it was foretold near the start in a card reading .The novel is also litter with pictures that help you picture the people and things mentioned so well .

After all ,I carried him inside me ,like you carry a child is it my fault ? is a pregnant woman guilty for having a belly ?

The closing lines of the book as Izolda looks back .

I liked this book last year when I read it but left it to review it  and as I feel it is going be a strong contender for this years Independent foreign fiction prize 2014  I decide to do it today .The book is a very different novella it is very polish in that I mean it is firmly rooted in the polish reportage style of writing .The little choppy chapter keeps you as a reader at the edge of your seat as you follow the bits of Izolda life but also the greater world around her ,bit she does remind me of scenes from Schindlers list where one women visits Schindler as she is hiding but want help for her family ,another thing I was remind of is the german film Europa ,europa the true story of Solomon Petrel a German jew that pretend to be a Nazis to survive the war .I was so touched by Izolda feeling about suriving it mus have been so hard to have been a survivor of this horror.Yet again Meike from Peirene  has shown even the field of holocaust fiction can be enriched by wonderful books like this .

Have you read this or any other books around the Holocaust ?

The last day of a condemned man by Victor Hugo

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the last day of condemned man Victor Hugo

The last day of a condemned man by Victor Hugo

French Literature

Orginal title  Le Dernier jour d’un condamné

Translator – Christopher Moncrieff

Source personnel copy

Well I want to add more depth to the blog over the next couple of years so Victor Hugo is a great choice for this .Victor Hugo was the best known writer of his generation ,he started as a poet and then later developed into novelist he is of course now best known for his novels now ,especially Les miserable and The hunch back of Notre-Dame  .This book was his first novel it also includes the short story Claude Gueux .

Why should what I write here be of use to other ,stop judges from judging ,spare unfortunates ,innocent or guilty ,the agony to which I have been condemned ? What’s the point ? What does it matter ? After my head has been cut off ,what is it to me if they cut off other people’s ?

The narrator wonders why he is writing about his last day

This book is about what it says on the cover and that is the last day of a condemned man ,we met the narrator Unnamed ,we don’t know how he got to be waiting for the guillotine .What we do know is the room he is in the prison and prisoners around him ,what happens on the day of an execution .He is visited by the priest .The narrator comes across a stoic you sense he has fear but is doing his best to bury not to near the end he breaks down and appeal to the crowd for a pardon ,he is driven to this after he has met his daughter earlier and she seems to forgotten her father .The second part of this book is the story of Claude Gueux ,which is a true story of a prisoner ,that due to something happening when he is in  prison  for five-year  ends up  sentenced to death ,a heart-wrenching  book that shows how one simple mistake that is the cause of a death ,it also the intolerance of prison authorities sometimes  .

The man stole .I don’t know what he stole or where he stole it from .What I do know is that  the outcome of this theft was three days ‘ food and heat for the women and child and five-year in prison for the man .

From Claude Gueux a man who stole for his family but end up dead as he fell out with the prison authorities during those five years .

Well I had read hunchback years ago in my teens but  something makes me think it was an abridged version (as it never stuck in my mind a lot as abridged books sometimes do as they cut the soul from some books )which is why I hadn’t maybe got round to Hugo .He was from the romantic movement of writers but this book is more a social justice piece Hugo was against the death penalty and wrote this book to show people how it felt to be on death row .I was reminded at times to the film from the Dead man walking where we see how this narrator described his world and last day at times was very similar too Sean Penn’s characters last day ,the talking to the priest ,the last meal ,the last visit with family and the final walk to the end .Hugo was an influence on many writer ,I can see a huge connection to Dickens another writer that used his books to show the social woes of his day  .So I will try him again soon .

What is your favourite book by Victor Hugo ?

 

Miruna , a tale by Bogdan Suceavă

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Miruna ,a tale

Miruna a tale by Bogdan Suceavă

Romanian fiction

Orginal title Miruna, o poveste,

Translator – Alistair Ian Blyth

Source – review copy

Well I have review a number from the Czech based publisher both review and personnel copy they always choose gems so when this book by Bogdan Suceavă a Romanian writer ,that I had vaguely heard of I thought I give it a whirl especially when it was mention to have a fairy tale element to the story .Bogdan Suceavă is a mathematician he studied at both Bucharest and the Michigan state in the US ,he currently teaches at CSU in California ,he has written number of novels and books of poetry .This book won the Bucharest writers prize when it came out there .

But Grandfather was different from the others .The evening after our parents departed and for the first time we were left in our Grandmother’s care ,I heard him telling Miruna that this was the only place where you could see time passing ,where it was never entirely frozen .

The first meeting with their Grandfather they see how different he is .

Miruna , a tale is the story of a family the two grandchildren and their grandfather ,he tells the two children many stories one of the Miruna absorbs a lot of these stories but also that ability to see things  via her dreams .The grandfather weaves a world around them with the stories he tells them where real and surreal mix ,the stories try to tell the story of the last century in Romania  their great grandfather that went to Greece on a ship ,mainly in the place where they live which is the Carpathian mountains .He shows them how what happened changed the world and also how they can keep themselves tied to their past .So we see the Germans come but also werewolves and giants a sort of folk tales to tell the kids what happened but without letting them see the full horrors by making them seem like fairy tales .It also showed how their village and valley had seen so many changes but also tried it hardest to stay the same .

During the summer hoildays when we were told the story of the journey to Hellas ,Miruna had a fever and her first nightmare ,Our parents were not in Evil Vale at the time when something happened that frightened her .It was that summer we learned that the encrusted face of christ can be seen on a grain of wheat .

Miruna starts seeing things in her dreams .

 

I loved this short book it captured a world that is fast dying and that is the one where kids listen to the grandparents tell them the oral history but also mix in fairy and folk tales .Bogdan in his after word on this book mentions in the first line how much as a youngster he loved the works of Tolkien  ,I could see this as I know the main inspiration for the lord of the rings was the horrors that he had seen during the world war and use it for a cautionary tale .This book shows Romania which when you look at its history over the last hundred years has been at the centre of a lot of turbulent times  so he used similar tools by mix fact and fantasy .Also it showed how some places and people don’t always want the modern world as it is and love to cling to what has been great .If you loved the books of Sjon this is one I’m sure you will love .

Have you  favourite book with fairy tales ?

 

Pietr the Latvian by Georges Simenon

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Pietr-the-Latvian

Pietr the Latvian by Georges Simenon

Belgian crime fiction

Original title – Pietr le-letton

Translator – David Bellos

Source – personnel copy

Well when I heard earlier this year penguin was under taking retranalsting and publishing all 75 Maigret novels by the prolific Belgian novelist Georges Simenon I was really excited  ,I have read three of the books before but had always want to read them in the order they were published .Georges Simenon is probabkly the second best known Belgian writer after Herge . Georges simenon , started writing in 1919 and wrote his whole life on average writing 60-80 pages a day he wrote more than 200 novels and loads of short stories ,in fact he wrote so much and also published under a number of alias ,his own estate is fully sure what he wrote.Any to this the first of many I’m sure I will be reviewing over time the debut book of Jules Maigret Pietr the Latvian .

Maigret had a tough time disentangling his own feet from the dead man’s legs to extricate himself from the toilet .With swift professional movements he patted the man’s pockets .Clean as a whistle .Nothing in them at all

Maigret checks the body that maybe Pietr on the train toilet .

Pietr the latvian is a well known con man due to arrive in Paris and Jules Maigret has been assigned to try and capture him ,this man has been causing crimes all round Europe and is now heading for Maigret patch any way the train arrives and there is a body in the toilet of the train and it matches what they have been told about this Pietr ,but then they think he is dead they hear of another man appearing at a posh hotel the prime ground for this high-class con man who the man they were tracking Pietr is  ,so Maigret is now faced with the dilemma which is the real Pietr and what happened to get the body in the train ?

But what had he got against the American millionaire Mortimer – levingstone ? within an hour of the arrest ,the US embassy would lodge a protest ! The French companies and financial institutions on whose boards he sat would wheel in political support .

An homage to holmes in the name but what has this US millionaire to do with this story .

 

Well I hadn’t read this one and I must state from the start even thou the man describe as Maigret is younger than the one I have when reading the book which is a figure resembling Michael Gambon who had played Maigret in a uk tv series .So does this old book warrant a new translation well yes we see the greats of English crime fiction repackage and reissued .So yes its nice to see a translated crime book published in same way in a new version as English crime does .As to the book it is an easy read not taxing but I did find a couple of things as I read that I may not that is two nods to the great crime novelist Sir Arthur Conan Doyle at one point it is said holes sat and smoke three pipes ,rather like Holmes in the red-headed league when he said “It is quite a three pipe problem ” ,then there is a character called Mortimer as any Holmes fan would now he is one of the main character in the hound of the Baskervilles .So I think I will be getting one of these every month as they come out I have already brought the next two on my kindle to read .

Have you read Maigret ?

The Ravens by Tomas Bannerhed

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the ravens by tomas bannerhed

The Ravens by Tomas Bannerhed

Sweddish fiction

Orginial title – korparna

Translator Sarah Death

Source review copy

Tomas Bannerhed is a new writer this book was his debut novel it won the big August prize in Sweden and also a Boras prize for a debut novel .He has previously work as a teacher in university .The august prize committee praised it for been a bildungsroman firmly placed in the Swedish tradition .This is one of last years English pen choices .

Sit on the stone wall and see how many different bird calls I can make out ,waiting for the green woodpecker to show herself in the black hole ,poke her bayonet beak and at least say hello .No sign of life .Dead as a may day in church .My greeny yellow friend must have hacked out a home elsewhere ,moved away and laid he gleaming white eggs in a dead pine instead

Klas sees the birds as his friends in the chaotic world he lives in .

 

The ravens strangely enough arrived the same day as Crow blue a book I reviewed last year I had noted how strange it was to get books named after birds in the same family of birds ,in fact they also share narrators coming of age but unlike crow blue ,Klas is a young boy on the cusp of manhood .Klas lives in a rural farming community ,his family farm isn’t doing great this means is father Agne is struggling and is in fact going down a spiral into depression and woe .SO Klas has to live in this world his parents constant worry of how they are going to get by ,they expect him to one day take the family farm over .Klas is discovering the world around him ,girls and also he loves the nature around him especially birds .Klas struggles to order his life and how it is going to turn out for he sees beyond the farm and the life that has seemingly been mapped out for him .But as he is so young his fathwer despair wears of on him and he wonders if he is going mad him self .

“So you’re klas !” said Leo ,taking the floor  .” I recall Veronika mentioned you at some point .and now you are off to play Ornithologist ?”

“I wouldn’t call it playing “I said “we’re bound to hear mash warblers ,reed warblers and nightingales tonight and probably some common snipe and spotted crakes as well

“Oh will you ? well fancy that ”

Veroinka is Klas girl he is quite shy round her ,weren’t we all at that age !!

 

I loved this book ,it remind me so much of Black swan green ,a young man’s  struggle to grow into adulthood .I loved Klas world in some ways the seventies Sweden with its mentions of the world around him remind me of my own childhood .I could also associate with his feeling of despair at times as he sees adults struggle as I saw this many times in my own family growing up .Then there is the birds ,Klas is a keen birdwatcher ,this drove me right back to my childhood ,I was a member of the YOC  Young Ornithologists Club a junior club for birdwatchers so loved how Klas connect to the world around him and know why he did it as sometimes opening your eyes to the natural world can make your own world disappear .I hope this is a book that people pick up for in fact I felt as a story of a boy struggling into manhood it bets black swan green hands down ,which is saying something !!!

Have you a favourite book in the Bildungromans style ?

the art and craft of approaching you head of department to submit a request for a raise by Georges Perec

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perec

the art and craft of approaching your head of department to submit a request for a raise by Georges Perec

French fiction

Original title – L’Art et la manière d’aborder son chef de service pour lui demander une augmentation

Translator – David Bellos

Source – library book

Well as you can tell by the title this book is a little different .I have previously review his most famous book a life a user manual , a novel that works inch by inch through an Parisian house and the people who live their .Perec was a member of the Oulipo movement that like to challenge the writing using various devices .This book is from one such challenge a French computer expert in the sixties want to see if Perec could write out the various routes of a flow chart he had produced  and make it readable here is the result .Yes this flow chart as you may guess from the title is a guide on what is the best way to ask for a pay rise .

Having carefully weighed the pros and cons you grid up your loins and make up your mind top go and see your head of department to ask for a raise so you go to see your head of department let assume to keep things simple – for we must do our best to keep things simple – that his name is mr Xavier

so mr x is mr xavier actually the opening lines of the book .

The story follows an unnamed employee as he wants to as his head of department for a raise .The Head Mr x is some one he doesn’t know well ,but through the course of the story as the various ways ,times ,day he could approach Mr x are discussed we see the narrator construct  a life for his head of department has he a daughter, or four what happens if they have argued .Thus we see a man worrying about getting a raise and try to pick the absolute best time to do this task ! we see him work outr evry possible combination of outcomes .

watch the cafeteria menu because if fish is on the menu your line manager could easily swallow a fish bone and thereafter be in a really awful mood which will not be in your favour

Another option is before or after lunch to ask ?

 

I have always admire the Oulipo movement as in many ways it is hard enough to write ,but stay different and creative with follow a strict framework is harder .I was reminded in this book of the recent short novel by fellow Oulipo movement member Italo Calvino the castle of crossed destinies   where he like Perec in this used a device in that case build the story around a grouping of tarrot cards ,where as Perec has used the various outcomes on the flow chart to be the thoughts the narrator has as he awaits the right point to discuss his raise .That is it a short book 75 pages long neat translation by Bellos .An unusual idea but it works Perec has pulled of the challenge he was given .

Have you a favourite Oulipo movement book ?

Pushkin press fortnight 2014

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pp_logo

Now I now there has been a yearly event for Persephone books in the past .Now I want to start a yearly event for one of my favourite publisher Pushkin Press ,they are publisher of great translation and have just started doing a number of books from  English  as well .I am picking the middle  two weeks in February  2014  the 10th til the 23rd  , which ties up with the  anniversary of the death of Alexander Pushkin which of course whom the press was originally named after .I hope you can also tie these into my year-long Translation Bingo project .Recent highlights from Pushkin press  for me are –

The parrots by Flippo Bologna 

parrots Flippo Bologna

 

Jarmilla by Ernst Weiss

JarmillaTraveller of the century bY Andres Neuman

traveller of the centurySo what are you favourite books from Pushkin press ?

 

 

 

The castle of cross destinies by Italo Calvino

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castle of crossed destinies

The castle of Crossed Destinies by Italo Calvino

Italian Fiction

Orginial title – Il castello dei destini incrociati

Translator – William Weaver

Source – Library

Well I’ve review three  of Calvino’s books before on the blog the Cuban born Italian writer is one of my personnel favourite writers ,he is considered one of greatest writer of 20 th century ,he wrote in various styles from realistic like his book into the war I reviewed here ,which was based on his world war two experiences  ,to surreal  like if on a winters night which I reviewed here  and post modern .He was also a member of the Oulipo group of writers .

i also try to

Now I mention the Oulipo connection because this book is just a perfect example of what that movement hope to achieve .The book takes the form of fifteen tales told at a castle and a tavern .Now it is how the stories are told ,because the people in the book telling the stories have been struck silent and have now power of speech to talk to each other . So they tell each other their stories via a pack of tarrot cards and are narrator fills in the gaps and makes stories for each of them .so we meet an alchemist ,grave robber doomed bride amongst others  at the castle .At the tavern we have waverer ,a forest seeking revenge and warriors .The narratives told are similar in there ways to books like Decameron and canterbury tales .The cards frame the stories and characters .

calvino

The stories show how as Calvino said ” a finite number of elements whose combinations are multiplied in a billion billion” Thus a pack of tarot could throw up any number of tales ,but then we have how do we tell the stories ,is it through the words of the narrator or the pictures on the cards how do we decide where to go when the same card with different number appear in different stories .What Calvino does is to spin the tale each time from card to card as he chooses the cards for each tale so we see how each character arrived at the castle or tavern and what has happened to them rather like the tales of the decameron and Canterbury  ,there was meant to be a third part to this et at a motel in the future that Calvino never wrote .This book is very unusual and is one of those books people are going to either love or hate ,now I loved it I love the thought of playing with what is storytelling test the boundaries by in a way cutting the chances down I mean each of these stories is formed from a tarot pack which normally contains 78 cards so thou the stories are infinite the route of the story has only a 1 in 78 chance to move on .Have you read any Oulipo books ?I chooose to use pages instead of writing quotes as it illustrates the stories much better than just the writing as you miss half of it because of their being no cards to see .

All is silence by Manuel Rivas

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all is silence by Manuel Rivas

All is silence by Manuel Rivas

Spanish Fiction

Original Title – Todo es silencio,

Translator – Jonathan Dunne

Source – Library

Well I put this book down as Spanish fiction  although Manuel Rivas ,he is a Galician writer he is from that part of Spain and writes in Galician not Spanish and this book is a direct translation from his original .He grew up wanting to be a bricklayer like his father but was persuaded by his mother to become a Journalist poet  and writer .He was also one of the first writers  I reviewed on this  blog with his book The carpenter’s pencil .That  book was set in the civil war .This his latest to reach us in English is set in the Sixties onwards .

“The mouth is not for talking .It’s for keeping quiet .”

This was one of Mariscal’s sayings ,which his father repeated like a litany and Victor Rumbo -Brinco_ recalled when the other boy saw with amazement what was in the strange package  he’d pulled out the basket and asked what he wasn’t suppose to

“what’s that then ? what are you going to do ? ”

They have  mouths , and speak not replied Brinco laconically

The opening lines let you know what silence can mean .

All is silence is a book about friends growing up  and what happens when one takes one path and another takes another and there is a girl as well !,Finn and Brinco  are like peas in a pod but there is one thing they have between them and that is they both have a liking for the wild tom boyish ,but beautiful Leda .The boys like all boys spend there days on the coast having adventures with each other ,this although in a world under Franco and the fact their part of Spain (the same as the writer Galicia ,I heard it described as a bit like Ireland to England but from what I’ve read actually the north-east of the UK is a better idea for me ) ,anyway one day they find a large stash of Whiskey and fags stuck by the old school ,Now this is all very Enid Blyton in a strange way a world that although tough maybe isn’t in the kids eyes  to this point ,but then a man  in a hat appears and tells the boys that Mouths are for Silence .We then see the boys grow Brinco and Leda marry ,Finn has gone a different route than his friends he has left the village and returns as a policeman .This is a post Franco world and the smuggling that the boys saw as kids has grown and it’s not just cigarettes and alcohol now no the stakes have grown .What happened to the man they meet as a boy ?

Finn had his eyes closed .When you close your eyes ,beware what you might open ,He took a deep breath ,let go slowly like a mouth of wind .

Finn returning to his childhood home what awaits him .

Well like his other book I’ve read Rivas is a poetic writer he paints his homeland through a poets eyes ,he is a poet as well as a novel writer .I felt he built the tension well in this book as it went on .This world is based round  a love triangle ,power  who has it .What it means to be friends all play a part .This has already been made into a film in Spain .It’s one of those books that seem to get darker as you move on the strange switch from the childhood years which under Franco are viewed as dark but it is the post Franco time when the kids are grown that is darker .I must try his last book before this book burn badly .Have you read Rivas ?