Childish Literature – Alejandro Zambra
How does it feel to be a father? It is a sensitive, self-reflective state. I am always aware of the political and social tenuousness of my position, the expectation that I will disappoint, the lack of a solid script.
Egypt + 100: Stories from a Century after Tahrir – ed. Ahmed Naji
EGYPT +100 is anchored by an elegantly simple premise: invite a cadre of influential Egyptian writers to imagine what the country will be like in the year 2111—one hundred years after the 2011 Revolution.
City Addresses: Iman Mersal’s Rihla through a Dis(-)appearing Cairo
As [Mersal’s] recursive and often discontinuous writing attests, the drive toward progress tends to entail an imperfect erasure, whose traces might resurface—as if through a palimpsest—if only one cared to look.
Season of the Swamp – Yuri Herrera
Herrera’s novel conjures the past from its hiding spot in plain sight. What appears absent is in fact there, somewhere—only it requires the work of a skilled author to coax it to life.
From Savagery – Alejandra Banca
FROM SAVAGERY, the debut work of fiction by Alejandra Banca, beautifully translated by Katie Brown . . . gives a voice to a new generation of Venezuelan migrants creating life abroad.
Here, [Michael F. Moore] lends his English to Francesco’s angst and Claudia’s rebellion with the compassion of a parent who wants to support you without you knowing it, hiding in the bleachers at the JV soccer game with a silent smile.
Grandma Non-Oui – Lidija Dimkovska
Lidija Dimkovska’s new novel . . . explores how history mirrors human life itself: complex, recursive, non-linear, and defiantly inconclusive.
Underground Barbie – Maša Kolanović
For a novel set during debilitating times, UNDERGROUND BARBIE is frequently quite funny. The seriousness is masterfully cut, and paradoxically intensified, by the antics of the children and the scenarios they dream up.
The Summer Without You – Petar Andonovski
Despite its setting on the sun-soaked coast of Crete, THE SUMMER WITHOUT YOU shivers with the cold reckonings of disillusionment and adulthood
With her steady, precise attention to everyday life on this sad, cozy ward, Gråbøl gently troubles our received ideas about healing.