The latest addition to my website is Sakinu Ahronglong‘s 山豬 (Hunter School). Ahronglong belongs to the Paiwan people, one of the indigenous peoples of Taiwan and this is basically his story and the story of his people and their attempts to preserve their way of life. He does this by telling tales of himself, his … Read more
The latest addition to my website is José de Almada Negreiros‘ Nome de Guerra [Nom de Guerre]. This is a Bildungsroman but also a mocking of the conventional romantic novel. Antunes, a thirty year old man from the provinces, is sent to Lisbon by his uncle in order to make a man of him. He … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Martín Caparrós‘Sinfin [Endless]. The key theme of the book is immortality. We follow the development from the present time to 2072 of a system called 天, Chinese for heaven, which is a fairly sophisticated way of transferring the human brain to a smart machine, replete with artificial intelligence … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Sándor Márai‘s A zendülők (The Rebels). The book is set in May 1918. Four young men have just finished school and are waiting to join the army. They formed a gang at school which, initially, was just an anti-teacher and anti-parent gang but has become more sinister. They … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Leylâ Erbil‘s Tuhaf Bir Kadın (A Strange Woman). This is a feminist novel about Nermin, who is nineteen in 1950 and struggles both to be independent and to be seen as an intelligent woman, rather than merely as a sex object. Her mother, old-fashioned, a strict Muslim, is … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Patrick Modiano‘s Pour que tu ne te perdes pas dans le quartier (So You Don’t Get Lost in the Neighbourhood). This one starts in 2012 but still maintains the usual Modiano feel of the past. Our hero is Jean Daragane, a solitary man, a (former) writer, living in … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Olja Knežević‘s Katarina, velika i mala (Catherine, Great and Small). It tells the story of Catherine (Katarina), a Montenegrin who grows up in Titograd (now Podgorica), Yugoslavia, moves for a while to Belgrade and then back to Titograd as Yugoslavia breaks up, before moving off to London. Catherine … Read more
The latest addition to my website is César Aira‘s Margarita. This is not one of Aira’s best. The narrator, presumably based at least in part on Aira himself, is, just eighteen, and is to leave his hometown of Coronel Pringles (Aira’s hometown) to study in Buenos Aires. As the date approaches he is suddenly overcome … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Bernard Chambaz‘s Vladimir Vladimirovitch. This is a novel about Vladimir Vladimirovitch Putin, both of them. The narrator, called Vladimir Vladimirovitch Putin, is a former university professor, now a tram driver, a few months older than the Russian president, and similar in appearance. He has a dull life but … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Amanda Michalopoulou‘s Η γυναίκα του Θεού (God’s Wife). This is, indeed, the story of a fairly ordinary young woman (aged seventeen) who marries God, the conventional Christian God, who apparently gets lonely. He insists it is a platonic relationship but, apart from that, they live as man and … Read more