Georges Magnane: Où l’herbe ne pousse plus (Where the Grass No Longer Grows)
The latest addition to my website is
World War II
Roy Jacobsen: Grenser (Borders)
Yes, this novel is about borders, particularly national ones but also borders between people. Apart from a very large section involving the Battle of Stalingrad, much of this novel is set around the Luxembourg-Belgum-German border. We start with the Ardennes Offensive (aka the Battle of the Bulge) when a soldier serving in the US army … Read more
Per Petterson: Ut og stjæle hester (Out Stealing Horses)
The latest addition to my website is Per Petterson‘s Ut og stjæle hester (Out Stealing Horses). Trond Sander is sixty-seven. Within the space of a month , his second wife is killed in a car crash, in which he is injured, and his sister dies of cancer. He decides that it is time to retire … Read more
Sigurd Hoel: Møte ved Milepelen (Meeting at the Milestone)
The latest addition to my website is Sigurd Hoel‘s Møte ved Milepelen (Meeting at the Milestone). Published only two years after World War II, this book had considerable impact in Norway, as it deals with the issue of Norwegian collaboration with the Nazis. Our unnamed narrator has provided a safe house for the Resistance and … Read more
Jana Bodnárová: Náhrdelník/Obojok (Necklace/Choker)
The latest addition to my website is Jana Bodnárová‘s Náhrdelník/Obojok (Necklace/Choker). This novel tells the stories of two Slovak women – Sara and Iboja – who meet in their hometown after Slovak independence in the late twentieth century. Their stories and the stories of their families are the stories of Slovakia as we follow them … Read more
Willem Frederik Hermans: Herinneringen van een engelbewaarder (A Guardian Angel Recalls)
The latest addition to my website is Willem Frederik Hermans‘ Hermans: Herinneringen van een engelbewaarder (A Guardian Angel Recalls). Our hero is Bert Alberegt, a Dutch state prosecutor. In a hurry to get to a trial, he takes a short cut going the wrong way down a one way road and accidentally kills a young … Read more
Maurizio Maggiani: Il romanzo della nazione [The Novel of the Nation]
The latest addition to my website is Maurizio Maggiani‘s Il romanzo della nazione [The Novel of the Nation]. Despite its somewhat arrogant title, it is, in fact, primarily the story of the author’s family and, particularly his father, a man who fought in World War II, became a Communist, is austere and never shows any … Read more
Miljenko Jergović: Rod (Kin)
The latest addition to my website is Miljenko Jergović‘s Rod (Kin). This is an 800-page family novel, as the author calls it, but do not let that put you off. It is essentially the stories (mini-novels) of, primarily, his mother’s family, going back to the beginning of the twentieth century but also of his extended … Read more
Gabriela Adameșteanu: Dimineață pierdută (Wasted Morning)
The latest addition to my website is Gabriela Adameșteanu‘s Dimineață pierdută (Wasted Morning). The novel gives a panorama of Romania and its sufferings from the beginning of World War I to 1975. Much of what happens we see through the eyes of the seventy-year old Vica Delcă, who has had a hard life. Her father … Read more
Ingeborg Drewitz: Gestern war heute [Yesterday Was Today]
The latest addition to my website is Ingeborg Drewitz‘s Gestern war heute [Yesterday Was Today]. The novel follows fifty-five years in the life of Gabriele, from her birth in 1923 to the birth of her granddaughter in 1978. Unlike her mother and previous generations of women in her family, Gabriele seeks far more independence but … Read more