The latest addition to my website is Yuri Andrukhovych‘s Рекреації (Recreations). This is a thoroughly enjoyable anarchic take on the first day of Festival of the Resurrecting Spirit in Chortopil (it means devil’s town). We follow four poets, who seem to be more interested in alcohol and sex than poetry. Two come by train – … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Georgi Gospodinov‘s Физика на тъгата (The Physics of Sorrow). This is a postmodern novel narrated by the author or, at least, a man called Georgi Gospodinov, about his life and the life of his father and grandfather. The narrator initially identifies not only with himself but with his … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Nuruddin Farah‘s Sweet and Sour Milk, another grim tale from Somalia. Soyaan is feeling decidedly unwell and, by the end of the chapter, is dead. Has he been poisoned and, if so, by whom? The family, not wishing to make a fuss and also because Muslims bury their … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Enrique Vila-Matas‘ Bartleby y compañía (Bartleby & Co.). This is perhaps more literary criticism than a novel. It is narrated by a man called Marcelo who wrote a novel twenty-five years ago and has not written anything since. His new work is to be about writers he calls … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Alain Mabanckou‘s Les Petits-fils nègres de Vercingétorix [The Negro Grandsons of Vercingetorix]. I found this novel somewhat disappointing, as it is a bit disjointed and seems to be telling one story but never manages to get on with it. It is about the civil war and its effect … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Sophie Cooke‘s The Glass House. She did not make the Granta Best Young British Novelists list but I think that she should have done, as this novel is definitely better than some of the ones I read by those who did make the list. This novel tells the … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Lucia Etxebarría‘s Un milagro en equilibrio [A Miracle in the Balance]. This tells the story of Eva Agulló, a Spanish woman who, early in the novel, has given birth to a baby, Amanda, and recounts her life to that date. When young she had done lots of sex, … Read more
I have now read twenty Russians novels over the past couple of months, which should be able to give me some insight into the Russian novel but I am not sure that it does. Last year, I did the same with Icelandic novels but, of course, Iceland is a much smaller country and has a … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Leonid Girshovich‘s Прайс [Preis]. This novel is set in the fictitious town of Ijma, somewhere in Siberia, during the 1950s. It had originally been inhabited by a native population but Stalin had sent many Jews there, during the period when he considered all Jews automatically as dissidents. But … Read more
This is a lively account of the exploits of the Russian commander, Vasily Chapaev, a historical person who fought and was killed in the Russian Civil War, fighting against the Whites under Alexander Kolchak. The story is told by Furmanov, who appears in the book as Fyodor Klichkov, Chapaev’s political commissar during the campaign. Klichkov/Furmanov … Read more