Winter Flowers by Angelique Villeneuve

 translated by Adriana Hunter 

As the first world war is drawing to a close, Toussaint Caillet finds himself heading home from the Val-de-Grace military hospital where he's been undergoing facial reconstruction for wounds received two years before. At home wait his wife Jeanne and Leonie, the daughter he barely knows. Their reunion should, they feel, be a time of utter joy, but both feel separated and changed by the years they've spent apart. Short, but moving, the story follows them, particularly Jeanne, as they attempt to build a new life when their future has been snatched away.

It seems to me, though it could just reflect my reading, that there are more books written about soldiers coming home from war, than there are about the necessary adjustment that has to be made by the women to whom they return. Winter Flowers places the emphasis on the wife, Jeanne, as she attempts to re-connect with the almost-stranger who has returned from war. While her daughter Leonie struggles to find a resemblance between the photograph of the handsome father in soldiers' uniform and this newcomer with his masked face, Jeanne can't seem to recognise him at an emotional level. His injuries have turned him into an uncommunicative, morose man; his mask, which is supposed to protect the world from the sight of him, also becoming a way to hide from the world.

Throughout the war both Toussaint and Jeanne have kept secrets  - to spare the other from the horrors of the battlefield, or to hide the shortages of food and fuel that Paris is suffering from. These are comparatively small harmless deceits but they add to the gulf the two of them must now bridge. Slowly, gently, the story follows them as they reassess the missing years, and find a way to go forwards.

Snow, Dog, Foot by Claudio Morandini

translated by J Ockenden

Adelmo Farandola lives up in the mountains, as far away from other people as he can get - nearly at the summit in summer, further down in winter when snow and avalanches keep everyone else away. Once, maybe twice, a year he'll descend to the village below to stock up on food and wine, otherwise he prefers to be alone. If any enthusiastic hikers stumble upon him, he shoos them away, sometimes physically. The only person he sees regularly is the young mountain ranger who insists on stopping to chat, and who Adelmo believes is spying on him.
This winter though, he'll have company - a stray dog who won't be frightened away. As the snow falls and covers Adelmo's hut completely, the two huddle up inside to wait for spring, but when it eventually arrives and the snow begins to melt a gruesome discovery awaits them.

The first of Peirene's 'Closed Universe' series, Snow, Dog, Foot is an uncomfortable read, exploring the affects of self-imposed isolation on the mind and habits of an elderly man. 

Throughout the book, I found my response to Adelmo himself changing, feeling variously curious, repelled, sympathetic, as his life was slowly revealed. At first he seems a mildly eccentric, somewhat cantankerous, old man, just trying to maintain the self sufficient way of life lived by his forebears. His chosen place has enough for his simple needs; his hut was built in a spot proved to be safe from avalanches, there's an orchard nearby where he grows apples, a plot for potatoes, and a pasture where he once kept cows. Forget Heidi's Alm-Uncle, though; this isn't some pastoral idyll. Adelmo once lived in the village, and has retreated further and further up the mountain in an attempt to escape a long ago trauma. As his interactions with his fellow men have become less frequent, isolation has taken a toll on his memory, his grasp on reality has slipped, and life become one of almost feral animal existence, barely more civilised than that of the grudgingly-adopted dog.
With the uncovering of a human foot as the snow slowly retreats, Adelmo's state of mind finally slips, muddling current events with those of the war, and his story moves to a dreadful, devastating close. The final image isn't one which is easily forgotten.





Maryom's review - 5 stars
Publisher - Peirene Press
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

Picks 2019

My reading/reviewing took a knock last year, and I haven't read anything like the number of books I usually would. As a result, I haven't gone for a full Top Ten of the year (also, you might note, I'm late posting this). Anyway, here we are, with some of my favourite books of 2019





Stillicide by Cynan Jones. Breath-catching, heart-wrenching, stunning - a series of self-contained but linked short stories set in a bleak, not-too distant, future where providing water to big cities requires military precision and armed guards. Although it's a long step from Jones' previous works set in rural Wales, there's the same precision and attention to detail, his ability to get inside a character's head and create living, breathing people is just the same.






The Sea Within Me by Sarah Dobbs. More dystopian sci-fi, this time in an England threatened by rising sea-levels and terrorists. In grim, beleaguered Newark by the Sea, the government is trialing a scheme to combat crime and fear which erases anything unpleasant from people's minds - a way to keep the population happy, or a form of mind control?







The 'Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind' vibe continues with Bridget Collins' The Binding. A gripping tale of betrayal and hidden secrets set in a vaguely Victorian setting, unhappy memories are gathered by a form of magic, and bound into books. When Emmett is apprenticed as a bookbinder, he starts to uncover his own hidden memories - and his view of the world changes completely.





And The Wind Sees All by Gudmundur Andri Thorsson Another collection of short stories, this time fitting together like a jigsaw puzzle to paint a portrait of the inhabitants of an Icelandic fishing village. At a cursory view they seem happy, respectable, comfortable in their life and ways, but behind the smiling faces heartache, betrayal and deceit lurk.









My last pick - Once Upon a River by Diane Setterfield - is a bit of a cheat as I also included it in last year's 'best of' list; it was only available then as an e-book, now it's in 'proper' book form. It's an astounding piece of storycraft - a tale as much about the stories we tell ourselves to make sense of the frequently puzzling world, as it is about a girl rescued from the river one dark, stormy night.

Faces on the Tip of my Tongue by Emmanuelle Pagano

translated by Jennifer Higgins and Sophie Lewis


I'm not sure whether to describe this latest book from Peirene as a novel or a collection of short stories; the thirteen stories which make up the English version of Emmanuella Pagnano's work read like something falling between the two. Although each can stand alone, they link together to bring to life the inhabitants of a remote community high on a plateau in rural France. 

Some of the shorter pieces are more vignettes than stories, capturing a moment or mood rather than telling a tale, but I found a sense of loss - of happiness, or innocence - pervading them all. They aren't stories of 'happy ever after', more of the things that can go wrong in life - whether devastating like the accidental death of a small child, or the dark comedy of a random stranger turning up at a wedding instead of the expected relative. A childish prank goes wrong, an elderly man whose only purpose in life is automatically trotting out the tales of the district, another who waits everyday at the spot on a mountain road where his family died, a woman weighed down by life trying to commit suicide but thwarted by random strangers.

The plateau itself seems a slightly other-worldly place - the weather is always colder to that in the valley below - and somewhere that 'misfits' can find a home. In some of the stories there's a feeling that life is simpler there, that people are more in touch with themselves and nature, but maybe they're just more inured to pain and suffering.


At first the stories appear to be a random selection linked only by location, but as the reader progresses the relationship between them becomes apparent. Characters, while not appearing in every tale, show up again here and there, often seen from a different point of view, or at a different point in time; the child in one becomes the parent in another. Noticing this, seeing how the stories fit together, has the satisfaction of spotting that strangely-shaped jigsaw puzzle you've been searching for and seeing the whole picture come together as it slots into its space.

 
Maryom's review - 5 stars
Publisher - Peirene Press
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

Children of the Cave by Virve Sammalkorpi

translated by Emily Jeremiah and Fleur Jeremiah



In 1819 a scientific expedition sets out from Paris to north-west Russia, in search of a lost tribe belonging to the Paphlagonian people. It's led by Professor Moltique of the Academie des Sciences, a veteran of many similar expeditions including one in which he claimed to have encountered a yeti. He's accompanied by Iax Agolasky, an enthusiastic young man, somewhat in awe of Moltique, who will take notes of everything they find, and, as the expedition is expected to last several years, nine or so men to take on the practical, physical work around their camp. They settle in to their remote camp, but it's several months before they find any signs of the people they've come to look for. At first they believe the creatures they've sighted are animals with odd human characteristics. But it's equally possible that they could be children with animal-type 'disfigurements'. Opinion in the camp is divided. Moltique swings between a variety of explanations, seeming to be searching for the one which will give him most fame. The men in general treat them as game to be hunted. Only Agolasky sees and responds to them as human beings. And now they've been discovered, what will happen to these Children of the Cave?



Presented mainly as extracts from diaries kept by Agolasky, with linking commentary from an editor, this novel examines the response of so-called civilised men to encountering others outside their norm - fear (often expressing itself in violence), curiosity, and the desire to profit from them dominate, with little fellow-feeling for the children. Agolasky alone treats them as humans, wants to befriend them and learn how and why they came to live here so far removed from other people.

Agolasky isn't a shining example though. He has a tendency to consider himself 'above' the practical members of the expedition, despising them, dismissing them as mere brutes, governed by animal passions, who could never appreciate his finer feelings. 
As the years pass the restraints of society slip away (Lord of the Flies style) with outbursts of violent anger among the men, leading Agolasky at times to fear for his life. 

As so often with Peirene's publications, the story is short but packs a punch - chilling reminder of what can happen if we begin to treat others, particularly those outside our tiny social circle, as less than us, of dehumanising others because they don't conform to our ideas of appearance and/or behaviour. It's something that is seen around us, on the news, on social media, all too often.


Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

And The Wind Sees All by Gudmundur Andri Thorsson

translated by Andrew Cauthery and Bjorg Arnadottir


review by Maryom

Late in the day, the mist rolls in from the sea over the Icelandic fishing village of Valeyri, and with it comes the wind, finding its way into the houses it passes and seeking out secrets ...

For now though the sun is shining. Kata, the conductor of the village choir, cycles through the village on her way to a performance they're to stage that evening. To all appearances, she seems the perfect image of a carefree young woman, but behind her cheerful exterior lies a story of pain and heartbreak. In the houses she passes people stop for a second to watch her go by, and their stories too are revealed as the mist comes creeping in. 


There's an odd mix of cosy and chilling about this Icelandic tale. Superficially the village and its inhabitants seem serene, comfortable, respectable, agreeable. But that isn't the whole story. When the wind blows through, the mask slips, the curtain lifts, and for a few seconds we see what lies behind the happy, smiling faces. The snapshots of life show old friends meeting for dinner, a poet waiting for inspiration, a forgetful old man wandering the streets; little moments of their days when they reminisce on past troubles. Kata's story is the most disturbing of all, but others hide heartache, loss, deceit.
Underlying it all, though, is an unfailing warmth. Maybe despite our many faults, and the shocks and disappointments doled out by life, people and life are basically good, after all







Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Translated Fiction

Shadows on the Tundra by Dalia Grinkeviciute

translated by Dalija Valiukenas


review by Maryom


in 1941, as the German army advances from the west, thousands of Lithuanians, including 14 year old Dalia and her family, are deported by the Russians. First they're moved east, to work on a beetroot farm, then north to the Siberian arctic where they are part of a project to establish fishing factories along the coast. They have to build their own barracks, work twelve hour days (and more), receive barely enough food to survive on, succumb to lice, malnutrition, scurvy. The conditions are horrendous; life expectancy low. Somehow though, some of them manage to survive.

Based on actual events, in the words Dalia scribbled down and hid when she eventually returned to Lithuania, this book is a gripping, moving account of survival in harsh, inhospitable conditions made worse by lack of the basic human requisites of adequate food and shelter - in fact, existence is only made possible by stealing and burning wood from building supplies, and taking the fish which should be processed and sent south and west to feed Russian cities. 


Dalia isn't asking for our sympathy. There's little reminiscing about life back home. Although she does occasionally contrast 'then' and 'now', she knows that isn't the way to survive. Bad as the situation as, she has no choice but to accept it, make the best of it, and not give on on the hope that one day she will make it out alive.

The mass deportation of Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians was something I was aware of from history lessons, as were the often crazy, ill-informed schemes the Socialist bureaucracy came up with for harnessing the potential of their vast country. But dealing with people in their thousands and millions deprives them of humanity. This book brings a very personal insight into the suffering caused by these actions, putting a face on at least one of the nameless thousands involved.

Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Translated Fiction/non-fiction

Shatila Stories - edited by Meike Ziervogel

translated by Nashwa Gowanlock



Reham and her family are fleeing Syria in fear for their lives. She, her parents, her husband Marwan, younger brother Adam, and anything they can carry, plus a driver, packed into a small car. Their hope, to reach the comparative safety of Beirut and the Shatila refugee camp there, but first impressions are not good - rats scurry around their feet, flies crawl over the rubbish dumps, tottering buildings reach up to the sky, electric cables garland the alleyways. This is home now, for the foreseeable future, and there's nothing to do but make the best of it.

Peirene Press made themselves a name as publishers of short translated fiction, but they've recently become commissioners of original work exploring today's social and political problems to be published under the Peirene Now! banner. Their first foray into this field was to send two authors - Olumide Popoola and Annie Holmes - into the Calais Jungle refugee camp to bring to life the stories of the people there. Their second, a look at both sides of the Brexit question, in Anthony Cartwright's The Cut. This third takes the reader to the refugee camps of Lebanon, specifically the Shatila camp in Beirut, established as a temporary settlement for Palestinians in 1942, infamous as the scene of an horrendous massacre in 1982, and still receiving refugees today. This time the authors are not outsiders, but members of that refugee community brought together through the work of Peirene publisher Meike Ziervogel, London-based Syrian editor Suhir Helal, and Lebanon-based charity Basmeh & Zeitooneh. Meike and Suhir traveled to Beirut to meet with these keen but inexperienced writers, work with them for several days, showing them how to structure their stories, create tension and story arcs. From this came a series of stories which were then woven together and amalgamated to produce this book.

News headlines can tell us of the numbers of refugees fleeing Syria, which countries will offer them shelter in a camp, which ones won't - but behind those headlines lie people like us, not statistics for politicians to play with, and new articles often don't bring the day to day lives of the people concerned to life in the way that fiction can. Written by inhabitants of Shatila camp, this collection of interlinked stories sheds light on the plight of these homeless, stateless people born into refugee camps, effectively trapped there - with the wrong nationality on their passport, living or even just finding work outside the camp is nigh on impossible. There are stories which could be heard almost anywhere - a failing marriage, young love, a father forced to extremes to safeguard his daughter, a desire to rise above one's beginnings and make something of life - yet they remain unique to Shatila, and are an eye-opener on the world refugees are caught in.






Authors; Omar Khaled Ahmad, Nibal Alalo, Safa Khaled Algharbawi, Omar Abdellatif Alndaf, Rayan Mohamad Sukkar, Safiya Badran, Fatima Omar Ghazawi, Samih Mahmoud, Hiba Mareb



Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult contemporary fiction, short stories
Although labelled and marketed as 'adult' fiction give it to your curious open-minded teenagers to help them understand lives very different to their own

Soviet Milk by Nora Ikstena

translated by Margita Gailitis

review by Maryom



Set in Latvia during the years of Russian rule, Soviet Milk explores the lives of two women, mother and daughter, their dysfunctional relationship, and their attempts to find fulfilment under a regime which doesn't care about individuals.


Born just as Russia invaded Latvia at the end of WW2, the mother struggles against the system, refusing to accept its rules, and ending up removed from her prestigious research post, and banished to a remote village and the fairly humdrum work of running a women's clinic - an important enough role for the women she treats, but one she feels is beneath her. The focus of her life has always been her scientific work, and with exile in the countryside and loss of the work that she considers worthwhile she enters a downward spiral of depression.
Raised by her more pragmatic and nurturing grandmother, the daughter soon learns to accept things as they are, both personally and politically, to make compromises and live life as best she can. At an early age, she takes on the role of caring for her mother, in charge of everyday practicalities such as cleaning and cooking, but also helping through her increasing bouts of depression and anger. Ultimately though, she realises that to have a future of her own she needs to leave the claustrophobic atmosphere of home, and return to the city.

It's impossible to deny that for most of its length this is a rather downbeat story. It's easy to imagine that in a different time and place the mother would have had a brilliant scientific career, brought up a family in a loving, caring environment, but the repression she's felt all her life has left her emotionally damaged. At the end though I felt that the grandmother and daughter had managed to keep hope alive, that, despite everything, their future looked hopeful.
I rather wish I knew more of Latvian history, as I couldn't help but think that the mother's life perhaps echoed it - annexed by the Soviet Union, forced to live under an alien regime, and striving for freedom, sometimes hopefully, sometimes losing all hope. Maybe I'm over-thinking things again ... 




Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

Dance By The Canal by Kerstin Hensel

translated by Jen Calleja


review by Maryom

Gabriela has no place to live, no job, no friends or family who could help her, but for now she's found a snug spot under a bridge by the canal, and a stash of paper on which to write her life story. Born in the East German town of Leibnitz, the daughter of a respected surgeon, Gabriela's early life should have been an easy one of privilege but her parents seem remote and unloving, wanting an ideal child with talents to brag about, and at school she manages to make the 'wrong' sort of friends, irritating her parents even more.
Her father meanwhile is becoming increasingly outspoken about the Communist regime, her mother takes a younger lover, and by the time Gabriela is a teenager their comfortable villa has been exchanged for a tiny flat, and things are definitely on a downward slide ...
Then the Berlin Wall falls, and Gabriela hopes for better things, but has she by then become too much of a misfit to ever fit in?

From the point when Gabriela is homeless, sitting under the canal bridge and beginning to tell of her life, the story moves in two timelines - starting with her childhood one follows her troubles trying to fit in with what first her parents, and then the state, expect of her; the other begins at that moment sitting under the bridge, as she reflects on the past and is 'discovered' by a women's magazine and courted as an 'authentic' voice of the homeless. 
A square peg in a round hole is one way, perhaps slightly lazy way, of describing Gabriela - she never seems to quite understand what people expect of her, therefore can't play by their rules, and make a success of things. She's rootless and homeless long before she's without a roof over her head - her parents are distant and more concerned with their own lives that her well-being - and the only constant in her life is the canal - from childhood when she spent her happiest times playing and dancing there with her 'unsuitable' friend, to the shelter it offers her now.


It's a story which captures the readers attention and imagination. How could someone born into a position of security and respectability end up living homeless? Is it a slip anyone could make, or just Gabriela's fault? But, as I neared the end, I began to have second thoughts about Gabriela in her capacity as narrator. A word here, a sentence there, made me begin to think she wasn't maybe quite as she'd presented herself, but creating a persona to fit the expectations of the magazine editors. I read the relevant passages again, and still wasn't sure if I'd imagined it and was reading in something that wasn't there. It's one occasion when I've wondered if the translation of a Peirene novella didn't quite capture the feeling of the original. I definitely feel I need to re-read this book, but meanwhile if anyone has read Dance by the Canal, what did you think?
Maryom's review - 4 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

The Orange Grove by Larry Tremblay

translated by Sheila Fischman

review by Maryom

Despite the war raging around them, nine year old twins, Ahmed and Aziz, live a comparatively peaceful life on their family's orange grove - a tranquil, green spot hard won from the surrounding bare landscape. Then a bomb strikes their grandparents' house, and the boys find themselves caught up in retaliation for the attack. The leader of a group of militants, an important, pious man, both respected and feared in the area, prevails upon their father to persuade one of the boys to become a suicide bomber. The impossible decision of which twin this will be, is one which will split the family.
Years later, grown up and living in Canada, the surviving twin finds the past hard to leave behind, and impossible to explain to people who've never experienced war. Is it possible for him to find a way forward?

The Orange Grove is a short, powerful, chilling story of lost innocence, and the long-term emotional repercussions that follow the 'martyrdom' of this young boy. In our peaceful Western world, we believe that children should be sheltered from the horrors of war, but for those caught up in it, there's no such a luxury - in fact, men, women and children have lost their worth as individuals and become mere objects and statistics. The militants' leader has no qualms about manipulating the father through fear and religion so that he daren't refuse the 'honour' granted to his son; one son believes the hype, that becoming a martyr will be a glorious act, resulting in the deaths of his enemies and rewarded in heaven; the other is more pragmatic and would rather live, but this is marked down as cowardice. 

The Orange Grove is a disturbing, distressing read, dealing as it does with the forced recruitment of children into a war they don't understand,but one that I'd unreservedly recommend. By forcing the younger generation to take part in the escalating, reciprocated violence, the circle of war continues. While A attacks B, B strikes back, and A retaliates, there will always be one side calling for revenge on their attackers, and it feels like the conflict could never end. To break out of the destructive circle needs one side, or maybe just one person, to forgive.

This was an extremely thought-provoking read, even by Peirene's standards, and my original review draft contained a variety of rambling thoughts relating what I'd read to the recent events in Manchester and London. I've decided to delete them in the end, as they weren't really relevant in terms of a book review.

Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

The Last Summer by Ricarda Huch

translated by Jamie Bulloch

review by Maryom


Due to student unrest at St Petersburg university, the governor, Yegor von Rasimkara, has decided to close it indefinitely and spend the summer in the countryside with his family. Even so, he can't escape the threats that have been made against him. His wife believes he doesn't take them seriously enough and has arranged for him to employ a secretary who will also act as a bodyguard. Lyu is well-educated, cultured, fits in almost like a house-guest, and soon all the younger family members are drawn to him; the son Velya sees him as a role model; the daughters Jessika and Katya fall in love with this handsome outsider. Unfortunately, Lyu is hiding a secret - not only is he himself a supporter of the students and their demands, but he even has a plot of his own to kill the governor...



If a story has to be pinned down to fit a label, then The Last Summer, with its sense of violence and outrage about to erupt at any moment, is a psychological thriller. The tension is there from the start, with Lyu's arrival at the governor's house under false pretences, and steadily mounts as the reader sees how trusting and duped the family are.

The story evolves through the means of a series of letters - from Lyu to his revolutionary friend, between cousins, niece and aunt, brother and sister - which proves to be an excellent way of seeing 'behind the scenes' and listening in on private thoughts. The 'children' are, as might be expected, more progressive, and even revolutionary, in their outlook, representing various points along the line between acceptance of the status quo and outright rebellion. They act and talk like many a teenager with attitude but, despite their mother's view of them as still children, they're actually adults in their early twenties! I found Lyu himself to be the most enigmatic of the characters - even though he talks big, he seems at times to be trying to put things off. Maybe having got to know the detested 'figurehead' as a real person, he no longer feels so inclined to go ahead with his plans? While he prevaricates, the family continue totally unaware of his scheming ... and the tension rises ...


Although written in the early 20th century, and set in pre-revolutionary Russia, this story feels like it could fit almost anywhere, anytime; there are moments reminiscent of Chekhov (the whole Russian summer-in-the-country setting), others of the dilemma facing another secretary-cum-assassin in Sartre's Les Mains Sales written nearly 50 years later, and even of today's problems - with students and academics around the world being imprisoned and even executed for opposing their country's regime.

Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

Breach by Olumide Popoola and Annie Holmes

review by Maryom

Peirene Press have made their name as publishers of short, translated fiction, but this collection marks the start of a different project - commissioning authors to explore current issues through fiction, to bring social problems to life in much the same way that Ken Loach's 1960s film Cathy Come Home shed light on homelessness.


Behind the headlines of thousands of refugees heading to the UK are real people, individuals with their personal stories and problems, fears and pressures - fleeing war, persecution, hoping to be able to help family back home or maybe be reunited with family they've been separated from. So for breach, authors Olumide Popoola and Annie Holmes went to the 'Jungle' in Calais and spoke to the refugees, volunteers and locals before putting together this collection of eight short stories exploring various aspects of life for those in, and outside, the camp.

These stories are not intended to be verbatim accounts of things told to Popoola and Holmes, but reworkings of the tales they heard. After all, a good newspaper article can wring tears or anger from the reader; this process I would guess is nearer to an author drawing on their own experiences while writing fiction rather than autobiography.
Through the progression of eight tales, we see the plight of the Jungle's residents from a variety of angles; young men, refugees from various places, still trying to make it across Europe to Calais; the enforced calm of the Jungle where violence often lurks just below the surface; the attitude of volunteers, happy to hand out aid but not wanting to get involved at a personal level, and the contrasting view of those forced to accept this charity; the wary French locals, sympathetic and suspicious at the same time; the desperate measures risked to get on a lorry, van, train, or anything going towards England; exploitation by fellow-refugees turned people-smugglers and the often hostile reception that waits once the lucky ones eventually find a way across that slim stretch of water.

Above all, these stories are immensely readable - yes, they're undoubtedly thought-provoking but the story never plays second fiddle to the message.


Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult contemporary fiction, short stories

The Empress and the Cake by Linda Stift

translated by Jamie Bulloch

review by Maryom

Passing by a Viennese cake shop a young woman is enticed into sharing a Gugelhupf cake with an elderly lady dressed in a strange antiquated style, from head to toe in black. Normally this young woman is very conscious of what she eats, its calories and sugar levels, but somehow her usual objections fade when faced with the formidable Frau Hohenembs. The two new acquaintances head back to Frau Hohenembs' apartment, a space filled with strange curios and shared by parrots, an Irish wolfhound and a plump, equally black-clad, housekeeper, Ida.
There they share Frau Hohenembs' half of the cake, and the narrator finds herself being pulled into the life of this very strange and manipulative woman. They go for walks with the dog or visit museums - all very normal on the surface, but Frau Hohenembs is following a bizarre agenda, attacking and stealing items associated with the Empress Elisabeth, and the narrator feels compelled to go along with her plans.
Interleaved with this ongoing narrative, are reminiscences about the Empress Elisabeth by one of her loyal servants; a relationship which bears striking resemblances to that between Frau Hohenembs and Ida.

How would I describe The Empress and the Cake? Well, it's part subtle, tense psychological thriller but also an examination of addiction and loss of control. The Narrator (she's never named) has a history of eating disorders, of binge-eating and purging, which has been in abeyance for fifteen years, but which returns immediately after her first meeting with Frau Hohenembs. Throughout, she claims to be in charge of herself and the situation, believing she could walk away any time she chooses, but the reader can see that this is far from true; some part of her has come to rely on Frau Hohenembs, to need her dictating what to do and when.

The Empress and The Cake is part of Peirene's fairy tale series and Frau Hohenembs has at least a hint of the old crone, or even wicked witch, of folk tales about her; luring the innocent in with tempting food only to enslave them, or, as in the case of Hansel and Gretel, eat them!

Additional thoughts - when I read this I knew I was reminded of something else, a recent novel dealing with manipulation of one woman by another, but couldn't pinpoint it at the time. It's Alison Moore's Death and the Seaside which has threads of the power of naming, and suggestibility, rather than addiction but the two are interesting to read together




Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

Her Father's Daughter by Marie Sizun

translated by Adriana Hunter

review by Maryom

In German-occupied Paris, four year old France lives happily with her mother. Her world is made up of the two of them, their apartment, the streets and park close by, and occasional visits from her grandmother. She knows little of the world outside - of the war, of why there are Germans patrolling the streets, or of her father, detained far away as a prisoner.
But now, this unknown father is coming home, and France's world is going to change.
At first she's fearful of this man who's come between her and her mother, but then she decides to win him over, sharing her thoughts, stories and secrets, little understanding the implications of what she shares, or the likely fall-out from it.

Her Father's Daughter is a moving account of the relationship between a father and child, and an exploration of family dynamics - made all the more poignant by being based on the author's own experience as a child.


It's written, although not in the first person, from the child's point of view. The reader can easily see that France doesn't always understand what she sees or hears going on around her, and often interprets events in a confused childish way, but it still captures the child's attachment to her mother, her initial hostility to the man that comes between them, then the switching of sides as her father becomes the main recipient of her affection.
At the same time, the reader can understand why the mother has maybe indulged her little girl too much, but now wants to focus her attention on her returned husband, and why he, in his turn, feels odd and uncomfortable around this unknown child, and furious when the 'lie' is revealed.

Till the age of four, France's world has been comprised almost entirely of herself and her mother. Her life is happy and undisciplined - scrawling on the walls, singing strange songs she makes up herself, picking and choosing over her food, dictating what her mother wears. It's a life of freedom and fun, till her father comes home. A "father" is an unknown quantity to France - in their neighbourhood, fathers are mostly absent due to the war, and she can find them only in fairy tales, often vague but stern characters. When he arrives, her father wants order and quiet, not a child singing, stomping and generally doing as she likes - it's a shock to France! She also feels she's losing her mother's love, as she understandably turns her attention to her returned husband. But the dynamics of their relationships change, as France and her father grow closer, and the mother is pushed aside. I wondered how much France actually understood of the great 'lie' she wanted to expose - a four year old surely wouldn't have understood the full implications, but she certainly knew she should not mention it, and that revealing the secret would cause trouble. So, did she merely mean to share with her father something she considered very personal, or deliberately set out to cause trouble? I'm not sure.

For a long while I've championed one of Peirene's early publications, Friedrich Christian Delius' Portrait of the Mother as a Young Woman as my favourite of their books - but I think it may now have a rival.

Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction

The Man I Became by Peter Verhelst

translated from the Dutch by David Colmar

review by Maryom


A family of gorillas are snatched from their jungle home, transported across the sea, trained to become 'human' and used as part of the attractions of a theme park. One of them, the Narrator, learns well, is quickly promoted and receives the badge to prove he's now 'human'. But he soon finds himself torn between what he's been taught and what he instinctively feels, and when he discovers the theme park turns out to be hiding a clandestine trade he's driven to take action...

Now, this is a strange book and if I said 'It's about a gorilla who becomes human' I'm not sure all of you would be flocking to read it, but if I said "it's like a modern version of Animal Farm" or even somewhat like this clip from Not The Nine O'Clock News, where the animal becomes more human than his teacher, you might be tempted. Yes, it contains a certain level of ambiguity; should you consider it's events literally? is it, perhaps, set in some future world where animals actually can be changed into humans?  or is it a fable or fairy tale in which an animal acquires human attributes? or even a serious scientific experiment as seen in?  Probably best to not get hung up too much about these dilemmas, just read it.

The publisher, Meike Ziervogel, says it "leaves behind images that play in your mind long after you have closed the book", and she's absolutely right. I've read a couple of books, after The Man I Became, and found ideas from it creeping in to what I'm reading now.

Fables with animals as the main characters have always been used to shine a spotlight on our failings and teach us about human behaviour, both good and bad, and this story certainly does. I think it's a book that different readers will find different themes hidden in. For me, it spoke about slavery, immigration, man's destruction of habitat and the environment, and the way 'civilised' society is often heartless and cruel in ways that the 'natural' world isn't. Give it a try, and see what it says to you!

 Maryom's review - 5 stars 
Publisher - Peirene Press 
Genre - Adult Literary Fiction, translated fiction

The Looking-Glass Sisters by Gohril Gabrielsen

review by Maryom

Two middle-aged sisters live in an isolated house in the north of Norway; surrounded by open moorland, far from the nearest village, they live an almost solitary life. One,the narrator, has been handicapped almost all her life; the other, Ragna, has had to become her nurse. For years they've rubbed along together, not always amicably but reasonably so, the whole dynamic of their relationship changes when the unforeseen happens -  in her late forties, Ragna gets married. She now has someone else to care about, and her sister begins to lose the central part she'd played in Ragna's life. Ragna still has to care for her, but the main focus of her affection is her husband ....and the sisters' relationship begins to shift and warp.


I'd half-expected that the story-telling would alternate between the two sisters - giving opposing views of the situation - but it wasn't necessary. Although told throughout from the point of view of the invalid sister, my sympathies moved between the two. My automatic instinct was to side with the disabled sister, after all she's suffered many years of pain and is virtually imprisoned by her lack of mobility, but then, and even though the narrator is slanted against her, I began to empathise with the able-bodied Ragna. Since their parents died, Ragna has been sole carer for her sister, has presumably had to abandon dreams of a career or marriage to act as nurse, and is rarely appreciated for her troubles. Her sister meanwhile listens through walls, rummages through Ragna's belongings while she's out, and tries at times to be as much of a nuisance as possible! Some of her strategies would be hilarious, if the overall situation weren't so dark.

 It's not an easy 'cut and dried' book. Seeing events unfold from the perspective of only one of the 'players' is always suspect. Sometimes, cooped up in her room, the narrator invents scenarios, plays them out in her head to see what might happen - and sometimes the reader knows she's interpreted things wrongly, sometimes we can only guess.
Adding to the sisters' isolation is the landscape of northern Norway - endless expanses of moor and forest stretching to the horizon - and the extremes of weather. The ever-present sun of mid-summer contrasting with the total darkness of midwinter. Both hiding the natural division of day and night, but, whereas in winter the sisters huddle together, finding companionship in facing the elements together, in summer the constant glare is upsetting, disorienting, and works to separate the sisters,    .

 To my mind there were certain echoes of the Bette Davis/Joan Crawford film Whatever Happened to Baby Jane - two sisters forced into living together, one dependent on the other - but there's a lot less over the top drama and thriller-style suspense about it. It's a rather sad tale in the end. The narrator just wants things to carry on as they were, two sisters alone, meaning all the world to each other, but it's not possible.





translated from the Norwegian by John Irons

 Maryom's review - 4.5 stars
Publisher - Peirene Press
Genre - Adult Literary Fiction

Reader for Hire by Raymond Jean

review by Maryom

Marie-Constance has a beautiful voice and time on her hands, so she puts an advert in the paper and sets herself up as a reader for hire. She's rather surprised in these days of audio-books to find that there's a demand for her services but she quickly finds clients; a disabled teenager, an elderly widowed countess, a company director, an eight year old girl, a retired magistrate.
At first it seems like Marie-Constance's new career could end in disaster - the teenage boy is so carried away by her reading of a supernatural tale by Maupassant that he has to be rushed to hospital - but she realises that what is happening is that, by immersing themselves in her reading, her listeners are starting to re-engage with the world. As Marie-Constance reads her way through Baudelaire, Marx, Lewis Carroll and the Marquis de Sade she re-awakens thoughts of forgotten things - politics, sex or just going out and having fun.
 
Marie-Constance is a harder person to understand than her clients; she's rather lacking in personality, adapting herself to fit her listener, like a blank page waiting for words.

I hope Peirene won't mind me saying this, but this is an unusual book for them as it's rather funny. Marie-Constance's desire for something to occupy her time leads to a series of misadventures almost farcical at times; who would have thought that a little reading would lead to so much trouble with the police? - but it does for Marie-Constance as she's dragged along in the wake of her clients and their new found enthusiasms.
At the same time it has much to say about the relationship between reader and book - the way stories can unlock feelings within us, enable us to see ourselves and others differently, that reading isn't always an emotionally passive activity. This was a particularly interesting book to read shortly after hearing Jane Davis talk about The Reader Organisation - a movement she established which encourages shared reading as a way of working through difficulties, showing through literature that our problems - from relationships to finance - are not as unique as we think.


translated from the French original by Adriana Hunter

Maryom's review - 4 stars
Publisher - Peirene Press
Genre - Adult Translated Fiction

White Hunger by Aki Ollikainen

 review by Maryom

In 1867 after several years of failed harvests, a great famine descended on Finland, threatening the lives of all but the wealthiest. As winter takes hold, Marja's husband lies dying of hunger. Realising that if they remain on the farm, both her and the two children will die too, Marja leaves him and heads south towards St Petersburg where, rumours say, there's bread for all. Others are on the road too, a rag-tag hoard of beggars desperately seeking aid, and not all places are welcoming to starving travellers. Moved on from one place to another, Marja refuses to give up hope but keeps doggedly plodding on.
Meanwhile in the city, life goes on much as it always did - senators squabble over whose plan is the best to deal with the crisis, the rich refuse to help out, and Teo, a doctor, continues his work among the taverns and brothels of the seedier districts.
A chance meeting of Teo and Marja on the road leads to the first signs of hope....

White Hunger is a tale of endurance and hope. Marja's determination to continue despite the odds stacked against her, her constant belief that one day they will reach their goal and it will welcome them with open arms and full baskets of bread, is inspiring but heart-rending as her quest seems doomed from the start. Living hand to mouth, relying entirely on the kindness of strangers, her spirit seems indomitable even though starvation causes her mind to wander and her body to collapse. The reactions of the people she meets en route are understandable - everyone is suffering from the famine and, unless you're among the cosseted wealthy classes, to give even the smallest amount of bread or gruel to a beggar, may mean your own death.
Teo's experiences are different. Living in the city, he's comparatively sheltered from the dire effects of the famine, but he comes to realise that the problem of beggars roaming the countryside in search of food can't be solved by those like himself who have little real understanding of the plight of the people - a situation seen today in the attitudes of governments towards the poor and refugees.

It's a story that takes the reader to unknown places - with our centrally-heated houses and shop-bought food we're hardly likely to encounter such conditions, but the unrelenting frozen landscape slowly seeps into even the well-fed, armchair-snuggled reader's mind. I could easily imagine the frozen feet and hands, the soggy clothing, the tedium of taking to the road each day, the exhaustion at the end of it.
The story does end on a happier note with the return of warmer days in Spring and the natural hopefulness that comes with it, but there's a feeling of a nation waking from a long nightmare and still being haunted by it.

As a slight aside - Although circumstances are very different I found a lot of similarity between Marja and Izolda, the heroine of Hanna Krall's Chasing the King of Hearts published by Peirene a couple of years ago. Both women show a determination to cling on to every last scrap of hope and persevere through adversities, even though their goal seems to move further and further away.




 Maryom's review - 5 stars
Publisher - Peirene Press
Genre - Adult Literary Fiction, translated fiction 

translated from the Finnish by Fleur Jeremiah and Emily Jeremiah

Re-visiting "Portrait of the Mother as a Young Woman" by Friedrich Christian Delius

a new view from Maryom

I always say this - Portrait of the Mother as a Young Woman by Friedrich Christian Delius and translated from the German by Jamie Bulloch - is my favourite of all Peirene's books, so I approached a re-read with a little bit of trepidation - would it live up to my expectations or would I be disappointed?
Well, all the aspects I loved first time are still there - the slightly rambling, all-encompassing thoughts of this young German woman as she makes her way across Rome in January 1943. Having travelled from Germany's Baltic coast to join her husband, she's almost immediately been left alone as he was transferred to North Africa. From a pious church-going background, she's used to accepting the opinions of others - first her father's then the dictates of the Hitler Youth leaders - but now she's almost alarmed to discover thoughts of her own, that might not accord with either; her dominant wish, that her husband could find a safe posting in which to serve out the war, doesn't seem at all in keeping with German martial feelings. Rome itself is a bafflement to her; a mix of pagan and Catholic style, it seems exotic and sensual, and nothing in her Lutheran up-bringing has prepared her for it- merely walking unaccompanied through its streets seems an act of daring. 

Other aspects also struck me this time - most importantly Rome itself as more than a mere backdrop, almost a character in its own right; the route taken from Via Alessandro Farnese to Via Sicilia is given in such detail that every step of the way can be followed (on Google maps if not on the ground), and the sights and sounds are there before the reader's 'eye's'. I also was more conscious of the probable future awaiting these expectant parents; even assuming they both survive the war, their prospects are unlikely to be the rosy ones dreamt of.

I intend throughout this coming year to reread all of Peirene's catalogue, so although for now I'd still say this was my favourite my thoughts may change...

Maryom's review - 5 stars
Publisher - Peirene Press
Genre - Adult Literary Translated Fiction