- Open Letter Books
- Three Percent Problem
- Translated Book Award
- Translation Studies
- Translation Database
Yesterday afternoon we found out that The Conqueror by Jan Kjaerstad, the second book in the “Wergeland Trilogy,” received a glowing, starred review in Kirkus:
Back in the day, Jonas Wergeland was an inquisitive student, brilliant, capable of speculating that “Dante’s observations on the celestial spheres, based on Ptolemy’s theories, were at least as right or wrong as the theories about the universe with which he was confronted in his astrophysical studies.” Alas, it’s the here and now, and Jonas is a television personality, the most popular in all of Norway. The here and now doesn’t always agree with him; when we meet Wergeland, early in the pages of this sprawling postmodern whodunit, our hero, breast-obsessed (“it’s a long story altogether, that of men and breasts”) and bewildered, is being copiously sick, feeling “as if he were spewing over Oslo, over the whole of Norway, in fact.” Wergeland has reason to feel ill over the course of much of this novel, and it’s not just from all the aquavit; his wife, Margrete, has been shot dead in the first volume of the trilogy, The Seducer, and all fingers point at him. [. . .] Think of it as Kafka-meets-Billy Connolly, and you’re almost there.
In celebration of this, our first starred review, we’re giving away the five extra copies of the galley that we have here in the office. The book will officially release in February, with the third volume (more on that a little later) coming out in August. (And just to clarify a bit, these three books can be read in any order, independent of one another, but if you’re chronologically inclined, The Seducer is available in paperback from Overlook.)
This is a great wintry book that is ambitious in scope and incredibly compelling. Each chapter reads like a perfectly crafted short story, and taken as a whole, the novel is a stunning accomplishment. It’s no wonder Kjaerstad won the Nordic Prize for the third volume . . .
If you’d like to be entered in the drawing for one of these copies, simply e-mail me your mailing address at chad.post at rochester dot edu with “The Conqueror” in the subject line. Since the holidays are here and we’ll be slowing down next week, we’ll keep this contest open until the morning of the 29th.
Reviewed by Jeremy Osner
“The small stone plaza was floating in the midday heat. The Christ of Elqui, kneeling on the ground, his gaze thrown back on high, the part in his hair dark under the Atacaman sun—he felt himself falling into an ecstasy.. . .
Reviewed by Brendan Riley
This slender, uncanny volume—the second, best-selling collection of stories by Russian author Ludmilla Petrushevskaya to appear in the U.S.—has already received considerable, well-deserved praise from many critics and high profile publications. Its seventeen short tales, averaging ten pages each, are. . .
Reviewed by Rachael Daum
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Reviewed by Vincent Francone
The Whispering Muse, one of three books by Icelandic writer Sjón just published in North America, is nothing if not inventive. Stories within stories, shifting narration, leaps in time, and characters who transform from men to birds and back again—you’ve. . .
Reviewed by Camila Santos
Luis Negrón’s debut collection Mundo Cruel is a journey through Puerto Rico’s gay world. Published in 2010, the book is already in its fifth Spanish edition. Here in the U.S., the collection has been published by Seven Stories Press and. . .
Reviewed by Grant Barber
“South”
To have watched from one of your patios
the ancient stars
from the bank of shadow to have watched
the scattered lights
my ignorance has learned no names for
nor their places in constellations
to have heard the ring of. . .
Reviewed by Larissa Kyzer
When Icelandic author Andri Snær Magnason first published LoveStar, his darkly comic parable of corporate power and media influence run amok, the world was in a very different place. (This was back before both Facebook and Twitter, if you can. . .
