You, like me, may never have heard of Ostap Vyshnia. That’s the pseudonym of a Ukrainian writer and satirist who was very popular in Ukraine in the 1920s … words to make any re
Hans Jonathan (1784–1827) was a most unlikely Icelander. With his dark complexion and curly hair, he looked very different from the others. And he was a man who had reinvented hi
Sedd is no ordinary Norwegian schoolboy, having been raised by his grandparents, who own and run the Fåvnesheim Mountain Hotel, a grand edifice with its glory days behind it. As t
This is a book about obsession. That, and what is revealed in the jacket copy – an aspiring 35-year-old writer notices, by chance, at a post office, a man of whom he used to be j
It takes a poet who lives amidst our daily clutter to see the near as something distant. With this vision, he hones his provocative craft, picking with bird-beak precision until he
Almost exactly fifteen months ago, I reviewed Pol Koutsakis’s first thriller in the Stratos Gazis series, Athenian Blue. I said at the time that I couldn’t wait for the next on
Trick, the latest offering in English from Domenico Starnone, one of Italy’s most renowned writers, and translated expertly by Jhumpa Lahiri, follows a few days in the life of a
A Swarm of Dust is the second part of Flisar’s unofficial ‘Village Trilogy’, all of which have been published by Istros Books (My Father’s Dreams, Two Loves; One Death,
Gine Cornelia Pedersen’s explosive debut made a big impact in Norway, drawing stylistic comparisons to ‘a punk-rock single’, and receiving, in 2013, the Tarjei Vesaas prize f
Anita Naaka has committed suicide by jumping into the path of oncoming train, leaving her grown up daughter, Norma, alone. As Sofi Oksanen’s novel starts, we find Norma looking f
