Translated from French by Geoffrey StrachanPublished by Maclehose Press, 2010, 201 pages. Original version published in 2007. This is a story narrated by Raj, an old man looking back at a crucial period in his childhood, a time that changed his life forever. Raj grows up in Mapou, a village in the north of Mauritius, …
Demon Copperhead: Barbara Kingsolver
Published by Faber / HarperCollins, 2022, 548 pages. “My thinking here is to put everything in the order of how it happened, give or take certain intervals of a young man skunked out of his skull box, some dots duly connected. But damn. A kid is a terrible thing to be, in charge of nothing. …
Tokyo Express: Seichō Matsumoto
Translated from Japanese by Jesse KirkwoodPublished by Penguin, 1971, 149 pages. Original version published in 1958. The bodies of a man and a woman are found on the beach on Kyushu. The way the bodies are lying, and the empty bottle of orange juice near them—which was found to contain cyanide—seems to point to a …
Monkey King—Journey to the West: Wu Cheng’en
Translated from Chinese by Julia LovellPublished by Penguin, 2021, 339 pages. First published in English in 1942, translated by Arthur Waley. Original version published in 1592. Some books never age but feel as fresh as if they were written yesterday. Monkey King is one of these: a Chinese classic, written in the 16th century. Its …
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Reading the World: A Conversation with Ann Morgan
Photo: Igor Emmerich Ann Morgan is a British author and literary explorer. In 2012, Ann challenged herself to read a book from every country, recording her quest at ayearofreadingtheworld.com and in the non-fiction book Reading the World. She is also the author of two novels, Beside Myself and Crossing Over. Her next non-fiction book, Relearning …
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Fresh Dirt from the Grave: Giovanna Rivero
Translated from Spanish by Isabel AdeyPublished by Charco Press, 2023, 157 pages. Original version published in 2020. A mad aunt threatens to reveal a family secret; a Japanese woman forms a bond with her quiet lodger; and two orphans are taken in by their alcoholic aunt. These short stories by a Bolivian writer are a …
Search Sweet Country: Kojo Laing
Published by Penguin, 1986, 351 pages. “Back in the streets Accra had one eye shut: at nine o’clock, the taxis were driving towards sleep; and with the open eye, with the one bright headlight, they moved to the cines, the wake-keepings, the spiritual churches, the still-talking compounds, the society meetings, the discos, the night-classes, the …
Small Things Like These: Claire Keegan
Published by Faber & Faber, 2021, 116 pages. 1985. It is almost Christmas in New Ross, a small town in Ireland. Bill Furlong, a coal and timber merchant, is making his deliveries before the holidays. The bitter cold means that he has a lot of orders to fill. Furlong is the son of an unmarried …
Travels in Lika: An Interview with Mary Novakovich
Mary Novakovich is a UK-based journalist and travel writer. Photo: Adam Batterbee Her book, My Family and Other Enemies: Life and Travels in Croatia’s Hinterland (2022), won the 2023 British Guild of Travel Writers Adele Evans Award for best travel narrative book, and was also shortlisted for the 2023 Stanford Travel Book of the Year. …
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Dear Wednesday: Kat De Moor
Translated from Spanish by Robin Myers2024, 202 pages. Original version published by Grupo Editorial Círculo Rojo SL, 2021, 218 pages. Natalia Missidenti is on the train back to Geneva. Reaching for her umbrella, which has slipped to the back of the luggage rack, she finds a box. She looks around: it does not seem to …
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