The latest addition to my website is Luiz Ruffato‘s O verão tardio (Late Summer). Our hero/narrator is Oseias Moretto Nunes. Like the author, he was born in Cataguases, a small town in Minas Gerais. He had lived in São Paulo but is now divorced, estranged from his son, out of a job and seemingly dying. … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Emilio Fraia‘s Sevastopol (Sevastopol). This consists of three linked stories inspired by Tolstoy’s Sevastopol Sketches, though only one is actually set (in part) in Sevastopol. All three, however, are about people struggling with relationships and struggling to find meaning in their life. The first is about a Brazilian … Read more
The latest addition to my website is João Gilberto Noll‘s Harmada (Harmada). This is another strange novel from the Brazilian writer. We follow an unnamed man, a former actor, as he drags himself round an unnamed country, capital Harmada, with a few strange, unexplained adventures. He will end up in a homeless shelter, where he … Read more
I have now read twenty Brazilian novels in a row by twenty different authors. The oldest one was first published in 1902, the most recent in 2014. Six of the novels were by women. This is the seventh years in a row I have done this and I am not running out of countries. Indeed, … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Antônio Xerxenesky‘s F. It tells the story of Ana, a young Brazilian woman who travels to Los Angeles to meet her uncle, a former anti-Brazilian government guerrilla. He realises that she is a superb shot and has her trained with guerrillas in Cuba. She then becomes a contract … Read more
The latest addition to my website is João Gilberto Noll‘s Hotel Atlântico (UK: Hotel Atlântico; US: Atlantic Hotel). Our nameless hero is seemingly a man whose identity is unclear and not just to us. He drifts around Brazil, apparently having no family or friends and no fixed abode. Indeed, he does not have any luggage. … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Hilda Hilst‘s A obscena senhora D (The Obscene Madame D). Our narrator is Hillé,a sixty year old Brazilian woman. Her husband, Ehud, has died and she has now become even more reclusive than she was when he was alive. Ehud was always interested in sex and a normal … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Ignácio de Loyola Brandão‘s Não verás país nenhum (And Still the Earth). This is the classic Brazilian dystopian novel, published in 1981 (when the military junta was in power) and referencing both the then current situation in Brazil as well as the elements we are now more concerned … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Oswald de Andrade‘s Serafim Ponte Grande (Seraphim Grosse Pointe). This novel, published in 1933, is an avant-garde, absurdist work. De Andrade switches between various styles – courtroom drama, poetry, dialogue letters, journalism, even dictionary entries – as he tells, in fragments, the story of Seraphim Grosse Pointe, a … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Moacyr Scliar‘s Os leopardos de Kafka (Kafka’s Leopards). This is a clever fable, whose unlikely hero, known as Mousy, is a Jewish tailor. He was born near Odessa and, in 1916, is entrusted with a mission by his dying friend, on behalf of Trotsky, to obtain a coded … Read more