The latest addition to my website is Aleksander Majkowski‘s Żëcé i przigodë Remusa. Zvjercadło kaszubskji (Life and Adventures of Remus), the first and almost certainly the last Kashubian novel on my website. Kashubia is in the North-Western part of what is now Poland, west of Gdánsk. This novel, first published in 1938 soon after its … Read more
If you have been following this blog recently, you will have noticed I have been reading selections from the shortlists/winners of literary prizes. This was a response to the disappointing (for me) Man Booker Prize shortlist. One thing I did discover is that there are far more literary prizes than I had imagined. Wikipedia has … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Emily St. John Mandel‘s Station Eleven. This book has been shortlisted for the US National Book Award, with the winner to be announced 19 November. This is a post-apocalyptic novel, but don’t let that put you off. As you will see in my review, there are a already … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Wilson Harris‘ Heartland. This book is a follow-up to the Guyana Quartet, with three of the characters from the Quartet – Da Silva, Kaiser and Mariella – appearing in this book. Zechariah Stevenson Jr’s father, also called Zechariah, had a successful mining company, which went bankrupt when its … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Jun’ichiro Tanizaki‘s 春琴抄 (The Story of Shunkin; later: A Portrait of Shunkin). This is another novella from Tanizaki about delving into the past and about sex, though the sex is decidedly lower key than the last two Tanizaki novellas I reviewed. This tells the story of Shunkin, born … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Fiona McFarlane‘s Night Guest. This book is on the shortlist for the Australian Miles Franklin Award. It tells the story of Ruth, a seventy-five year old woman who lives alone in what had been the holiday home of her and her husband, Harry. Harry had died of a … Read more
The latest addition to my website is two novellas by Jun’ichiro Tanizaki: 蘆刈 (Ashikari; later: The Reed Cutter) and 少将滋幹の母 (Captain Shigemoto’s Mother), both published in English in the same volume. The first is a short novella telling the tale of a man (the author) who decides to visit the Minase Shrine, site of an … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Jorge Franco‘s El mundo de afuera [The World Outside], the winner of the prestigious Spanish Alfaguara Prize this year. This is an excellent novel, mainly set in Franco’s home town of Medellín, Colombia and mainly involving the kidnapping of a rich man, Don Diego Echavarría Misa. Don Diego … Read more
The latest addition to my website is Elena Quiroga‘s Presente profundo [Profound Present]. This is a very intelligent novel on death, time and life. Rubén is a doctor and comes across two Galician women who both kill themselves. Neither are in any way connected, apart from their sex and nationality. Indeed, while he knew one … Read more
We have already had the Prix Femina – Haitian novelist Yanick Lahens won with Bain de lune, and the Prix Médicis – Antoine Volodine won with Terminus radieux and today we got the Prix Renaudot with David Foenkinos winning with Charlotte and the Prix Goncourt with Lydie Salvayre winning with Pas Pleurer. None of these … Read more