Arrivederci, Europa Challenge

For the past five years now I've run the Europa Challenge, a blogging challenge for bloggers who incorporate books published by Europa Editions into their reading and reviewing. At the end of this year I'm wrapping it up.

The URL is europachallenge.blogspot.com. I'm ending the Challenge due to diminishing participation. At our height we had posts going up almost every week; now we're down to maybe one or two a month, just me and one other person, and mostly just me. So it's time to go.

But we've had a lot of fun in five years. Here are some fun facts and statistics about the challenge.

In five years we had

• 38 reviewers/bloggers posting about 
• 250 reviews of 111 books 
• by 77 authors,  
• as well as 3 giveaways and
• a holiday book exchange.

Random Statistics:

• Most reviewed book: Cooking with Fernet Branca by James Hamilton-Paterson (8 reviews)
• Most reviewed author: Elena Ferrante (13 reviews)
• Most viewed review: Barbara B.’s review of Audrey Schulman’s Three Weeks in December with over 1000 page views
• Most popular search term: Europa Challenge
• Most-searched-for author: Alexander Maksik
• Most viewers come from the United States and Russia
• Average monthly page views: 1000
• Most Active Reviewers: Me with 51 reviews, and Josh with 33 reviews

A few selected quotes from Europa Challenge reviewers:

Trish R. says of My Brilliant Friend “Ferrante captures the uncertainty and confusion of youth.”
Josh says Caryl Ferey’s Mapuche “keeps the reader locked.”
Helen G. says Jean-Claude Izzo’s A Sun for the Dying “gave me a double dose of insight into the plight of the homeless.”
Nancy says Valery Panyushkin’s 12 Who Don’t Agree is “a definite must-read that gets well beyond news stories we listen to with only half an ear.”
Suzanne says Eric-Emmanuel Schmitt’s The Most Beautiful Book in the World is “an apt description for the entire book.”

Readers enjoy the plots, characters, writing and social messages in the books, and the books are like potato chips- you can't read just one. Once you get hooked on the brand, you're hooked.

A few years ago Europa launched their World Noir initiative which rebranded their international crime line and moved them to the mystery section of the bookstore. That helped bring a whole new set of readers to the brand and expand their reach even further. Their crime novels have always been favorites of mine and it was great to see this change.
For most people the "gateway book" was Muriel Barbery's The Elegance of the Hedgehog, but I'll bet the recent success of Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan Quartet will change that and more readers will come to the brand through those very successful books.

Personal highlights for me include the friendships I've made through the blog, and my two visits to the Europa Editions office in NYC and one to their headquarters in Rome, where I got to meet company founders Sandro and Sandra Ferri.

So thanks to all the readers and bloggers who contributed, and thanks to Michael Reynolds and everyone at Europa Editions who's been so supportive of the blog for the past five years!

Review: CECILIA, by Linda Ferri

Cecilia, by Linda Ferri. Published 2010 by Europa Editions. Literary Fiction. Translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein.

The story of a Roman woman who becomes a Christian martyr, Cecilia is absorbing historical fiction about rebellion and finding yourself. Set in the second century A.D., Cecilia starts when its title character is about 15 and still living with her parents, noble Romans involved in public life. Her mother is bereft following a series of miscarriages and early deaths of her children; her father is distracted and Cecilia is left to her tutors, her friends and mostly to herself. She dreads marriage and soon finds herself questioning her society's values and looking elsewhere for fulfillment.

The book is immersing but really takes flight once Cecilia becomes involved with a local group of Christians and starts to navigate this new world and her place in it. They become like a new family for her, after her marriage has faltered and her relationship with her parents strained. But like any family they are fractious and fight among themselves as they all try to figure out what it actually means to be a part of this fledgling religion. I liked that these people don't have it all figured out yet, that they struggle and experience doubts and conflicts. Cecilia finds her calling in service to the poor, and she tries to set aside the internal politics of the new church and focus on this central mission to give her life meaning. Watching a woman of her class living the word of Christ, Cecilia reflects "...I understood that if prayer is words, the word is not a dead letter but life and love. She was a rich matron, and now she has callouses on her hands from so much work and blisters on her feet from all the miles she walks to visit the needy."

But what she's doing is illegal in Rome, and she is soon called upon to denounce the faith or risk
execution. Her family tries to intervene, but what will be her ultimate fate? That's not really a mystery but watching her approach it is fascinating and moving, and it makes me want to visit the church in the Trastevere neighborhood of Rome, which was the real-life Saint Cecilia's home and is dedicated to her. Through the twists of history she is the patron saint of musicians but this book a rumination  of her life rather than her legend. I recommend it to readers of literary and historical fiction and for adults who read YA for the way it examines the life and mind of an adolescent.

This is my 16th book for the 2015 Europa Challenge. You can visit the blog at EuropaChallenge.blogspot.com.


Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: THE POPE'S DAUGHTER by Dario Fò

The Pope's Daughter, by Dario Fò. Published 2015 by Europa Editions. Literary Fiction. Translated from the Italian by Anthony Shugaar.

Of all of Europa's summer offerings, this was the book that attracted me the most, being about Lucrezia Borgia, one of the most (in)famous members of that very famous and powerful family. Her father, Rodrigo, served as Pope Alexander VI, at a time when the Pope headed an army and the Papacy was as much about the Earthly as the spiritual- maybe more so. Lucrezia herself was a pawn in her father's political maneuvering, married several times to various members of the European nobility as it suited either Rodrigo or her brother Cesare, also politically ambitious but not as inclined towards the Church. She was also the subject of another recent novel, Sarah Dunant's 2013 Blood and Beauty. To get started, I would definitely recommend The Pope's Daughter to Dunant's readers.

Like Blood and Beauty, The Pope's Daughter tasks itself with reinventing or redefining Lucrezia, whose reputation has tended to be that of a femme fatale. Fò tries to show us that she was an intelligent, strong woman who often resisted her family's manipulations and who truly loved and was loved in return.

Unlike Dunant's novel, Fò writes his in a tone that reads as history- in other words, you might forget that you're reading fiction.

All of the many chroniclers and historians of the Borgia agree that Rodrigo came to Rome at roughly the age of eighteen, eager to place himself under the protection of the Spanish pontiff. This is just the first sign of the shameless nepotism of this high prelate, who gladly footed the bill for all the expenses the young man faced. Rodrigo had as his personal instructor none other than Maestro Gaspare da Verona, a man of great learning and extraordinary skill as a teacher.

He continues in this vein and even interleaves his own illustrations of the characters throughout the narrative, as if he were writing a textbook and not a novel. But it is fiction even though it's based on history. He is clearly smitten with Lucrezia. "No one," he writes, "would ever have suspected that there was such a fiery spirit in her," as she tries to raise troops to save her brother from one of his escapades. He gives his leading lady a tender side when it comes to personal relationships; she cares deeply for her father-in-law Ercole and develops a tight friendship with his daughter, a powerful woman in her own right. Fò portrays Lucrezia as a player with a heart, a woman who grows from a malleable girl to a shrewd and tough woman who can hit as hard as she kisses.

Overall I found the novel entertaining. The action flows along at a good clip and getting to know his Lucrezia is fun. Fò does less than Dunant to portray her sex life and he tries to dispel the incest rumors that have dogged her reputation. He portrays Cesare as almost uninterested in women and
really doesn't have much to say about her other brothers. He portrays Rodrigo as a kind of boor and his relationship with his daughter as affectionate but distant.  I think the book would be great for historical fiction readers, maybe as something different for people who have read all those Tudor books and want a new scandalous family chronicle for the beach bag or book club. It's a solid read and very enjoyable.

This is my 15th book for the 2015 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: ALFA ROMEO 1300 AND OTHER MIRACLES, by Fabio Bartolomei

Alfa Romeo 1300 and Other Miracles, by Fabio Bartolomei. Published 2012 by Europa Editions. Literary Fiction. Translated from the Italian by Antony Shugaar.

Alfa Romeo 1300 and Other Miracles is as about as delightful a novel about serious issues as you are likely to find. Four middle aged guys- a grocery store operator, a car salesman, and a TV pitchman- meet when they independently pick the same day to view a property in the Italian countryside ideal for transforming into a bed and breakfast. Individually it's out of their price range but together they can swing it. They open their dream B&B, and then they take on the mob.

The fun begins when an elderly representative from the local organized crime ring comes calling regarding the mens' new business. What happens next, and next, is not what I expected. I don't even want to tell you too much about the basic premise because I enjoyed watching it unfold and wouldn't want to ruin that for you. What I will say is that as the men build their dream, they get to know each other and assemble a band of friends and helpers including Elisa the cook and an African immigrant named Abu, whose help proves essential as events swirl around them and their new "family." The guys get up to some pretty crazy stuff, and they almost get away with it.

Almost but not quite also describes the fate of the bed and breakfast. At the end of they day they do all succeed in changing their lives, but not the way they think they will. The book is part black comedy, part social commentary, and completely enjoyable. I definitely recommend this one for the beach bag.

This is my 13th book for the 2015 Europa Challenge. You can participate at EuropaChallenge.blogspot.com.


Rating: BEACH

FTC Disclosure: I received this book from Europa Editions for review.

Europa Challenge Catch-Up Part 2

Well now I've officially surpassed my goal of 12 Europa books, having just read my 13th, Fabio Bartolomei's delightful Alfa Romeo 1300 and Other Miracles. I will admit I haven't loved them all unreservedly but there have definitely been some gems.


Billie, by Anna Gavalda. I liked this okay but didn't love it. The narration was somewhat manic and confusing at times; a girl is waiting with her best friend who's been injured on a hike. Little by little we get the story of their friendship, and how they ended up in this situation. She's worried her friend will die, and she recounts their story as much for herself as for him. It would be a good YA crossover title. Translated from the French. Backlist.

The Frost on His Shoulders, by Lorenzo Mediano. I feel like I want to re-read this. It's a beautiful and moving story of forbidden love and the price one man pays to prove himself worthy of the woman of his dreams. The story takes place amid a deeply traditional rural Spanish community and reads a bit like a fairy tale. I rated it 4 stars on LibraryThing and I remember liking it a lot. Translated from the Spanish. Buy.

The Distant Marvels, by Chantel Acevedo. A group of women are trapped together during the hurricane that took place in Cuba in 1963, which heavily damaged the island. One woman reminisces about her life during the revolution and the role her family played. She also reveals the terrible secret of her son's fate, a sad tangle of good intentions and misunderstanding. Buy.

The Proof of the Honey, by Salwa Al Neimi. An Arab Muslim woman talks about sex and its role in the Arab world, or lack thereof. It's an interesting and provocative read. Translated from the Arabic. Buy.

Of this batch my favorite is definitely The Distant Marvels, an old-school historical tearjerker, but The Frost on His Shoulders is a sleeper that I think a lot of people would really enjoy.

I'm not done with Europa this year! I still have a couple of unread titles on my bookshelves (you know, one or two), including the new Massimo Carlotto, Elena Ferrante and much more. And there's great stuff still coming out! I'm particularly excited about The Pope's Daughter, a take on Lucrezia Borgia from Dario Fò. Having read Sarah Dunant's Blood and Beauty not too long ago, I'll be interested to read Fò's version.

Participate in Europa Challenge at EuropaChallenge.blogspot.com.

Review: THE GERMAN MUJAHID, by Boualem Sansal

The German Mujahid, by Boualem Sansal. Published 2009 by Europa Editions. Translated from the French. Literary Fiction.

If you read about the Holocaust, or Islamic fundamentalism, or France, or immigration, or Algeria, or about people, The German Mujahid is required reading.

Set in modern day France among a French-Algerian-German family, Boualem Sansid's book tells the story of Rachel and Malrich Schiller, born in Algeria to a German father and an Algerian mother. The brothers move to France, and Rachel becomes a successful executive while Malrich flounders  in the banlieue, one of the sprawling suburban high-rise communities filled with the poor encircling Paris. While Rachel assimilates, travels the world and becomes a model citizen, Malrich falls in with the Islamic fundamentalist gang ruling the roost in his housing development.

The narrative is made of excerpts from the two brothers' diaries. When the book opens Rachel is dead. There was a massacre in their Algerian village in which their parents were killed.Their father Hans was an esteemed member of his community, but after his death Rachel finds out that his father was also an escaped Nazi war criminal. Rachel then destroys himself trying to ferret out his father's every last secret, spending the rest of his life learning as much as he can about what his father did and documenting his search in his diaries. He wills his diaries to his brother, whose journals reflect his own torment and struggle to understand what Rachel did, what his father did and how to make sense of his own life.

It's a tough read all around, a really difficult book that will challenge readers' assumptions on many levels. Sansal offers us a glimpse into corners of French life rarely seen and into the hearts of two men who battle conflicts difficult to imagine. The brilliance of this book is how Sansal shows us how hard they fight for air, for understanding and for life even as the tides try to drown them. Rachel didn't make it, but there is some hope that Malrich will. In any case I think this is a really important, powerful book and one everyone should read.

I read it for the 2015 Europa Challenge.


Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Europa Challenge- Playing Catch-Up

Taking the NYC subway has given me a lot of time to read and most days you can find me with my nose stuck in a book, usually a Europa. But I haven't been blogging a lot, for various reasons, and once again I'm behind on reviews. So I'm going to do a big post with lots of little reviews to catch up.

Of Beasts and Beings, by Ian Holding. This book is comprised of two intertwined stories, one set in modern day Zimbabwe as a white teacher named Ian is getting ready to pull up stakes for South Africa. He's disassembling his home, selling possessions, saying goodbye to friends and his longtime servant. He's also reassessing his life and himself. The second story is set in a nameless place and indefinite time, about a man who becomes literally shackled to an itinerant group who use him as a human mule. One story is terrifying, the other thought-provoking, and then they intersect in a most unexpected way. I loved this book but it was a tough read in places. Buy.

Arctic Summer, by Damon Galgut, is a fictionalized biography of E.M.Forster. I'd recommend it to readers of memoir and biography, because it is so heavily character-driven. It covers the period of his life leading up to the creation of his masterpiece A Passage to India and features his failed attempts at relationships. Galgut depicts his character has self-absorbed, misogynistic and insecure, and yet still makes the narrative compelling. I enjoyed reading Arctic Summer but it was slow at times. LGBT. Backlist.

The Island of Last Truth, by Flavia Company, is a quick read about a man trapped on a desert island after the boat he is sailing is overrun by pirates. This is a modern-day story and the pirates are terrorists of the sea, engaging in any number of crimes. The man finds out he's not alone, and what comes next is breathtakingly suspenseful and ends with a shocking twist. I liked this one a lot but it was too short. Translated from the Italian. Backlist.

My Berlin Child, by Anne Wiazemsky, is a World War 2 story about a privileged young woman named Claire who becomes an ambulance driver and falls in love with an impoverished Russian prince. Based on the life of Claire Mauriac and written by her daughter, it's romantic but probably only of interest to fans of the author, a famous French actress, or her mother, the daughter of writer Francois Mauriac. It would make a good movie probably but I found it self-absorbed and dull. Translated from the French. Borrow.

Gourmet Rhapsody, by Muriel Barbery. Since Europa just announced they'll be publishing her third book, I thought I should catch up and make sure I've read the first two. This book takes a minor character from The Elegance of the Hedgehog and put him front and center as he's dying.  Pierre Arthens, famous food critic, is dying and reminiscing about his favorite foods. Rhapsodic food writing alternates with bitter remembrances by those who knew him, and you can read between the lines in his chapters to get his take on the relationships in his life. I enjoyed this book but didn't love it. It felt a little disjointed to me. Translated from the French. Backlist.

I have a few more to review so stay tuned over the next week or so.

Review: Two by Marco Malvaldi

Game for Five and Three Card Monte, by Marco Malvaldi. Published 2014 by Europa Editions. Crime Fiction. Translated from the Italian.

In 2014 Europa Editions came out with the first two volumes in the Bar Lume mystery series, by Italian writer Marco Malvaldi. If you love light, funny crime fiction that isn't dark or gory, that fits right in your beach bag and can be read in the time it takes to eat an ice cream cone, these books are for you.

Game for Five and its follow-up, Three Card Monte, star bar owner turned amateur detective Massimo, who gets drawn into investigating crime in the first book when a young woman turns up dead near his bar. The crime becomes an instant and irresistable subject of gossip among his crowd of grey-haired regulars, a quartet of old guys who hang out all day chatting and playing cards. The police are clueless and incompetant (though not as overtly corrupt as they are sometimes portrayed by others), benign bumblers who can't put the pieces together. So Massimo, who doesn't want to play detective, who just wants to be left in peace to judge his customers by what kind of coffee they drink, ends up getting involved, much to his chagrin. The second book is about a Japanese scientist who turns up dead during a conference and shows us another side to Massimo- his mathematics background.

Both of these books are great fun for the crime reader. I would recommend them in particular to readers who don't want gritty or depressing books- these books are light as a feather and well-crafted and entertaining to boot. Massimo is a great character and his cast of hangers-on are ornery and funny and real. Malvaldi makes you feel like you're sitting under an Italian umbrella nursing an espresso of your own as you listen to their back-and-forth. Great stuff.

These count as books 2 and 3 of the 2015 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BEACH

FTC Disclosure: I received these books for review from Europa Editions.

Review: MY MOTHER-IN-LAW DRINKS, by Diego de Silva

My Mother-in-Law Drinks, by Diego de Silva. Published 2014 by Europa Editions. Literary Fiction, Crime. Translated from Italian.

My Mother-in-Law Drinks isn't really so much a crime novel- there's no particular mystery, or crime that's being solved- as it is one very dramatic day in the very dramatic life of one Vincenzo Malinconico, an Italian criminal defense lawyer whom readers may have met in Diego de Silva's wonderful 2012 book, I Hadn't Understood. Vince', as he's called, is a bit of a loser. His law practice is a joke, and while he's had lots of problems with women in the past, things seem to be looking up. As this second installment opens he's living with the very desirable Alessandra Persiano, won in the first book. He's getting along better with his kids now and he's sticking up for himself with his ex-wife Nives. And he's got a great relationship with Assunta, his mother-in-law, who's just found out she has cancer.

All this comes into play in the aftermath of a very difficult situation in which he finds himself one day at the grocery store. Armed with a gun, an otherwise unremarkable computer engineer has taken control of the store. He has become unhinged after his son was killed in a case of mistaken identity and his killer allowed to go free thanks to the Italian court system. He tracks down the man he believes is responsible, a mafioso on the run but hiding in plain sight. And he takes Vince', the mafioso and another supermarket employee hostage, intending to try the man with Vince' acting as defense attorney. The aftermath of the hostage situation makes Vince' a temporary celebrity and while it seems like things might be looking up, Vince' is falling apart.

The story is told through the normally fractured Vincenzo's even more manic than usual narration owing to the trauma he's suffered. A characteristic of this series is his tangents and stories that pepper the narrative; he can't just tell you what happened, he's got to relate analogies and anecdotes and examples, and if you like his voice it's immensely enjoyable. I love these books; I love the asides and parentheticals and all his talk and nonsense. It's fun. The story itself is pretty simple; man tries to put his life back together after a trauma, and succeeds more or less, even if he doesn't come away unscathed. De Silva leads one important thread dangling at the end of the book, and I really hope he picks it up in the next one. And I hope there is a next one!

This is my first read for the 2015 Europa Challenge. Come on over to the blog & check it out.

Rating: BEACH

FTC Disclosure: I received this book from Europa Editions for review.

Join the Europa Challenge in 2015!!

Starting January 1, 2015, the Europa Challenge will be entering its fifth consecutive year. Do you like Europa Editions books, like The Elegance of the Hedgehog or the Elena Ferrante series? Do you love authors like Alina Bronsky, Gene Kerrigan, Stav Sherez or Jane Gardam? Do you love high-quality literary fiction or heart-pounding crime fiction from around the world?

Then we want you to join the Europa Challenge!

Sign up here with Mr. Linky, then come back to the blog whenever you post a review of a Europa book on your blog and leave the link on our monthly Mr. Linky post.

The Challenge levels have been revised and you no longer need to post on the Europa Challenge blog to participate, although if you would like to, email europachallenge@gmail.com and I will tell you how.


Books you read for any other challenge can count toward your Europa Challenge total. And the first level is only two books! Check it out, and sign up!

Review: JUST CALL ME SUPERHERO, by Alina Bronsky

Just Call Me Superhero, by Alina Bronsky. Published 2014 by Europa Editions. Literary Fiction. Translated from the German.

Alina Bronsky's latest novel is probably the hardest for me to get into, but was very rewarding once I did. Set in modern day Germany, she tells the story of Marek, a teenager whose face was mutilated after he was attacked by a rottweiler. Nowadays he's bitter, a virtual shut-in who wears dark glasses and avoids others until his mother makes him go to a support group for disabled people. Things take a while to improve. He's cynical and uninterested in the others, whose issues range from terminal illness to physical disability to mental illness.

Her earlier books, Broken Glass Park and The Hottest Dishes of the Tatar Cuisine, were favorites of mine that tackled family dysfunction in ways that were painful and real. Her latest takes a slightly different subject and works it over with the same level of psychological insight and literary craft.

The book was hard for me because I can relate to some of Marek's issues. When I was a teen I was in a car accident that left me with a permanent disfigurement; but luckily it's one that I can hide most of the time and I've always said I feel for people with facial disfigurements because I can just put on long pants and that's that. When it's your face, there's nowhere to hide, and the self-conscious feeling I have at the beach or the gym is the way some folks feel all the time.  So it's tough, and you've got to learn to be very strong to muscle through it.

But when you're young (and even when you're older) toughness can mean anger and Marek is still angry, at himself, at the accident that changed his life, at others whose glances and expressions remind him that he's different, even if it's only his appearance that's different. He's infatuated with Janne, a beautiful wheelchair bound young woman in his group, competing for her attention with other young men and behaving like the immature kid he is. When the group goes on a trip together things come to a head and he alienates some members of the group. At the same time though he gets word that his estranged father has died, and what happens next surprises everyone, Marek especially.

I ended up loving this book with its tough-necked characters and the insights they gain into each others' lives. The tone of the book changes in the final third and this was where it all came together for me as Marek learns things that challenge his assumptions about everything, himself most particularly. It's a must-read for Bronsky's fans and also provides a lively portrait of modern German life at that same time its themes of redemption and growth are universal. Sometimes, the person in whose eyes you most need to be redeemed are your own, and learning that is the hardest thing of all.

This is my 13th book for the 2014 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I borrowed a galley copy of this book from the bookstore where I used to work.

Book Review: ELEVEN DAYS, by Stav Sherez

Eleven Days, by Stav Sherez. Published 2014 by Europa Editions. Crime Fiction/Mystery.

When it comes to series, I rarely read past volume one. It's not that I'm anti-series; I just usually don't get hooked enough to continue, and in the case of crime fiction, I'd rather sample lots of series than delve too deeply into one. It's a way for me to get to know a little about a lot of authors and stories, so that I can recommend books approrpriately to my customers and friends.

Eleven Days is book two of British writer Stav Sherez's Carrigan/Miller series, so you can tell right away I'm a fan. The first book in the series, A Dark Redemption, was a favorite of mine in 2013, one of the best books I read that year of any genre and Eleven Days is a worthy successor. After finishing the second installment, I'm confident this series has a bright, dark future.

Set again in London and featuring his detectives Jack Carrigan and Geneva Miller, we start out with ten dead nuns and one other dead person in a London convent. Police find their charred bodies after fire tears through the building and little by little clues emerge.  The nuns have connections to bad guys in South America and Eastern Europe- lots of people who'd like to see them dead, for different reasons.  Several of the bodies bear the marks of torture. Financial records point towards work in South America and ties to the leftist liberation theology movement. The nuns also had run-ins with Albanian drug lords and sex traffickers next door. And the church itself is not being particularly cooperative with our investigators. We also see more developments in Carrigan and Miller's ongoing rapport and hints that there are serious problems in Miller's personal life as well as Carrigan's. We see them pursuing different tracks of the investigation and coming to conflict with each other over theories and execution, so to speak.

Just like A Dark Redemption, Eleven Days is a great page-turner. It's grisly and gory and delves into not one but two troubling aspects of modern geopolitics, as well as the more prosaic, and tragic,  story of a girl who thought she could make a difference in the world. There's enough here for three books, and Sherez weaves it all together into a cohesive and absorbing tale. I like that we got some hints about Miller's troubles, and I hope to read more about that lousy ex of hers in a future installment. I'm also glad that there doesn't seem to be any romance in the offing for Carrigan and Miller, at least in the short term. Romance plots are a distraction from the far more interesting questions of how to simply get along with other troubled human beings.

Anyway as you can tell I enjoyed Eleven Days quite a bit. I'm definitely hooked as far as following the rest of the books, however many Sherez has planned. I'm still kicking myself a little for waiting for the US release and not buying it when I was in London last year. Oh well. If he's got a new one when I go back, I won't wait!

Tomorrow come back from my interview with author Stav Sherez!

This is my 12th book for the 2014 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I received this book for review from Europa Editions.

Book Review: THE UNKNOWN BRIDESMAID, by Margaret Forster

The Unknown Bridesmaid is one of the best books about the dark side of childhood I've ever read. It's the story of a girl who grows into a troubled teen and then a deeply dysfunctional adult who helps others without realizing how much help she needs herself.

Julia is raised by a secretive, authoritarian mother who belittles and shuts her daughter out. Nobody will talk about her father, who died when Julia was five. Julia grows up with her mother's sister Maureen, Maureen's beautiful daughter Iris and later Iris's family, consisting of her second husband Carlo and daughters Elsa and Fran. But before there is a family with Carlo there is a wedding to Reginald, Iris's first husband and Reggie, her little son, who die, and nobody will talk about them, either.

This ordinary family holds a lot of secrets, and Julia grows up believing she has the most devastating secret of all. This secret gives her guilt and shame, but it also gives her power. Julia is a deep introvert who cannot find a way to fit into the warm, extroverted family with whom she must live after the sudden death of her withholding mother, who taught her to disdain her cousin.  Her feelings of insignificance are transformed into bullying and aggression towards Elsa, Carlo and Iris when her mother's death leaves her feeling abandoned and alone. As an adult, Julia becomes first a teacher and then a counselor to troubled children, but it takes meeting an unhinged adult who strikes Julia as another version of herself, to get her to face her childhood demons.

Of course in her chosen profession Julia is reliving and dealing with her issues every day, even if she doesn't realize it. And here's the thing. Julia is not a nurturer; she is clinical, detached and strategic, and even to the end she cannot fully understand or admit to the damage she's done to the people who loved her, because she cannot admit her own importance to them. Margaret Forster's genius is convincing us how it happened, how powerless she felt, how frustrated by the silence around her, and how her actions made her feel like she mattered, made her feel like she could have an impact when all around she was told to be quiet, not ask questions, sit on the sidelines. It's painful to see how different things could have been for her. She can't understand, even into middle-aged adulthood, that she did matter to her cousin's family, and to her only friend. It might be too late to undo some of the damage, but not too late to make it better for somebody else.

Forster has written a quiet and devastating novel about how the wounds of childhood carry over into adulthood and how hard it is to let go of the image one has created of oneself, no matter how strenuously others contradict it. And it shows how precarious our lives are, how one person takes a wrong turn when someone else, equally flawed and vulnerable, doesn't. It also offers hope that it doesn't have to be this way, that healing and help are possible, if only one reaches out. It's a tough read and a beautiful one, too.

You'll find yourself thinking back on this book for a long time after you're done reading. It'll definitely show up in my favorites list this year.

It's the 11th book I've read for the 2014 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I received this book for review from Europa Editions.

Book Review: RED JOAN, by Jennie Rooney

Red Joan, by Jennie Rooney. Published 2014 by Europa Editions. Literary fiction; historical fiction.

Red Joan is an excellent novel based on the true story of an octogenarian British woman who was revealed to be the KGB's oldest living British operative. Of course what everyone wanted to know was, why? In the case of real life, the woman was a die-hard Communist true believer, but Jennie Rooney has decided to make her heroine an entirely different person and has crafted from this rich premise a tense and absorbing tale about love and what it means to be loyal.

Rooney alternates the narratives between the past and present, the present being when elderly Joan is brought in for questioning after the sudden death of a fellow spy. She is living a quiet life in England and her son, a successful lawyer, rushes to her aid. He doesn't believe that she could be guilty of passing nuclear secrets to the Soviets but as her story unwinds she gradually lets down her guard.

Set starting just prior to the outbreak of World War 2, Joan is not a true believer, but rather an ordinary lower-middle-class girl making her way at Cambridge. She encounters Sonya, a glamorous Russian who takes the mousy Joan under her wing and introduces Joan to her cousin Leo, a magnetic young man with whom Joan becomes infatuated. They become lovers. Leo is a committed Communist and Joan accompanies him to rallies and meetings, and while the philosophy behind Communism is not unappealing to her, she is largely apolitical. What she believes in is Leo, at least until she learns she can't. When war breaks out she is offered the opportunity to work in a lab doing nuclear research. The man who runs this lab is married but in love with Joan; she returns his feelings but is torn. At this point Leo, Sonya and their associate William step up pressure on Joan to spy for them.

Meanwhile in the later timeline, Joan slowly buckles to the pressure to tell what she knows, and has to explain herself to Nick.

I really loved this book. The last few chapters are tense page-turners as Joan's activities lead to consequences she doesn't expect and she has to work her way out of a very tight spot indeed.  Joan is an interesting character, an ordinary woman caught up in events and just trying to keep her head above water for much of the book. Then, when the waves crash too high, she has to pick a side. Rooney doesn't exactly convince us that Joan was right, but that what she did made sense for her at the time she did it, for the reasons she did it. Nick is the skeptical reader's stand-in and doesn't understand her, but Rooney shows us the past is another country. The story is more about relationships than politics,  the triumph of real love and the power of love to save ourselves, and others.


The readers I would have in mind for Red Joan like literary fiction, British war stories and a good love story, too. For me it was a winner.

This is the 10th book I've reviewed for the 2014 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I received a copy of Red Joan from Europa Editions for review.

Review: TAKE THIS MAN, by Alice Zeniter

Take This Man, by Alice Zeniter. Published 2010 by Europa Editions.

Sometimes I think Europa ought to take a handful of its titles- just a handful- and try pitching them to a Young-Adult or New-Adult audience because I bet some titles would work well for that demographic, and they never get to those readers because they are shelved and marketed as adult literary fiction. Given that the distinction is often one of marketing and not merit, since YA is used to distinguish many fine novels by audience, books often miss appreciative readers because of where they are shelved. Recently Europa readjusted its strategies with its mysteries, grouping them into a World Noir line, and I wonder if it would be worth their while doing something similar with a select group of titles for teen readers.

And yes I think Take This Man would be an excellent candidate for just such a move. Set in modern day France, it tells the story of a couple, if you can call them that, Alice and Mad, French twentysomethings about to get married. They have been best friends since forever- they've always known each other and they love each other dearly- as friends. But Mad is from Mali and not a French citizen, and he is about to be deported, at least for years and possibly for the forseeable future. In a last-ditch effort to stay in France and get on the path to legal residency or citizenship (I am unclear on this point) Mad asks Alice to marry him. Alice loves him and considers herself a "child of socialism," a Mitterand-era-raised liberal and biracial child of a Caucasian French mother and Algerian father. She understands racism, despises the conservative trends in French political and social culture and jumps at the opportunity to do something concrete.

Alice's voice is what makes this book so distinctive. Author Zeniter writes Alice as energetic, vibrant and full of life; her sentences run on, she goes back and forth in time with anecdotes, relates all kinds of details and stories. Sometimes she seems very immature; she refers to her parents as "Mommydaddy" and most of her time seems occupied with social life. The move to marry Mad can come across as ill-considered and impulsive, the act of a child. But she also expresses a lot of angst, concern and real trepidation over the consequences of the decision for her and her friend even if she spends a lot of time congratulating herself too. She comes back time and again to the panic over losing Mad, his anxiety over having to leave France, and how this is something she has to do, like she's trying hard to convince herself and the world this is the right decision.

I enjoyed the book because I liked Alice and cared about what happened to her. The style of writing with its run-ons and associations and endless anecdotes about parties and friends and teenage life was not really my cup of tea but I liked the social message and politics and the guts it takes to really put yourself on the line for what you believe in. It has a certain lightness about it if you will even given the serious subject matter and one disturbing incident of racial harrassment suffered by Alice and her parents when Alice was little. It's a neat look at modern French life and the energy and verve of the writing is more than enough to get you through.

This is my ninth book for the 2014 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BEACH

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Europa Challenge Update

I've read a bunch of Europas over the past few weeks and rather than write four long reviews I decided to just do quick recaps.

The Cemetary of Swallows, by Mallock. All over the place in terms of tone and style but compelling nonetheless, it tells the story of a Frenchman who murders an elderly man in the Dominican Republic, for reasons that no one understands. Mallock is also the name of the detective in this case, a friend of the murderer's sister. He starts his investigation in the DR where he encounters corruption, a house of amber and more, with just hints of the horrors awaiting him to discover back in France. The story then takes a turn to World War 2 atrocities and reincarnation. Along the way you'll be treated to prose both purple and page-turning, until this hot mess bumps its way to a pretty conventional ending. 2014. Translated from the French.


Seven Lives and One Great Love, by Lena Divani, is a light bonbon about a cat and the woman he
loves. A pretty white cat named Zach is adopted by a woman he worships for no discernable reason; she's not a very good cat owner, that's for sure. Anyway he remains devoted and tries with some success to win her affection and attention. This would be fun one for the beach bag. 2014. Translated from the Greek.

Margherita Dolce Vita, by Stefano Benni, is an older title that tells a coming of age story mixed with an anti-materialism message. Margherita is a dreamy teen who lives with two brothers and her parents and everything is peachy until the Del Benes move in next door with their black cube of a house and shopping-mall lifestyle. Things take a dark turn and Margherita must figure out how to save her family from the changes she sees coming- if she can. I liked this book and I think it would appeal to readers who like a little quirky in their literary diets. 2006. Translated from the Italian.

Revolution Baby, by Joanna Gruda, was my favorite though. This is a
quasi-novel about a Jewish Polish boy who is hidden during World War 2 and the Holocaust, in various places around France. Julek has a peripatetic childhood even before war breaks out; his parents, hard-core Communists, don't want to raise him and have him to live with Polish comrades of theirs. His mother takes him to France but sends him to boarding school, then sends him all over the countryside in an effort to keep him safe. Told from his perspective and in simple language, his is a story of alienation and the constant struggle to find a place for himself, find a family, find a place to call his own. The adult narrator makes no effort to contexualize what happened to his child-self so we have to read between the lines to understand and I like it when a book makes me work a little like that. I really loved this book and want to recommend it to everyone. 2014.

These are books 5-8 of the 2014 Europa Challenge! You can join this ongoing challenge at EuropaChallenge.Blogspot.com.

Review: TIME PRESENT, TIME PAST, by Deirdre Madden

Time Present and Time Past, by Deirdre Madden. Published 2014 by Europa Editions.

Fintan Buckley is a middle-aged, middle class man, with a wife of 24 years and three children- two teen-aged boys and a 7 year old girl, Lucy, the apple of his eye. They are Irish and live in Howth, an upscale seaside suburb of Dublin. His mother Joan lives nearby, as does his sister Martina. The time is just before the financial crash of 2008. Fintan enjoys history and finds himself fascinated by autochrome photography, an early form of color photography that had its heyday between 1907 and the early 1930s when it was replaced by subtractive color film. Fintan's interest in autochrome photography leads him to have certain hallucinatory experiences, taking him, and the narrative, in and out of his present life in ways that he never expects.

At the same time the life of his family goes on around him. He and his wife, Colette, manage their family as their sons grow up and their little girl explores her world; Fintan, who had thought he was finished having children, has found himself quite besotted with his youngest and enjoys being a father to her more than he ever thought he would. Colette gets to know his sister Martina, a beautiful woman with an eye for clothes and a good business sense but a slightly shady past. Martina is just returned from time spent living in London but won't tell anyone why she's come back. Now Martina's opened a boutique, and seems to be settling in, but questions remain. Joan is a fashionable lady with firm ideas about family but she harbors her own secrets as well. The family must deal with its past just as the future is about to launch itself onto their lives.

Howth Harbor, October 2013

I had not heard of Deirdre Madden when I picked up this book but it just looked like my kind of thing, and I have to say I really loved it. Madden is an excellent writer with a keen eye for detail and psychology and Time Present is solid, strong literary fiction that will appeal to lots of readers. I want domestic and family fiction readers to read this, and litfic readers generally. I know I want to read everything she's written now- I feel like I made a real discovery when I found this book sitting out in a bookshop in suburban Dublin, not far from the actual setting. And I was thrilled to see Europa publishing it and bringing it here, because I think lots of readers will love it and feel about Deirdre Madden the way I do- that she's one to follow.

It's my fourth book for the 2014 Europa Challenge.




Rating: BUY




FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: THE PALESTINIAN LOVER, by Selim Nassib

The Palestinian Lover, by Selim Nassib. Published 2007 by Europa Editions. Literary fiction. Translated from the French by Alison Anderson.

The Palestinian Lover is a book that keeps me thinking about it long after I closed the final pages. First, there's that title. To what, or whom, does it refer? The book is about a fictional love affair between Golda Meir and an Arab businessman named Albert Pharaon. So maybe it refers to Albert, Golda's Palestinian lover. Or maybe it refers to Golda; the French title is L'Amante Palestinese, amante being the feminine form of the word, and another English translator chose A Lover in Palestine as the title.

Certainly the book is about a woman who loves the land called Palestine, who has come from Europe and America to make a new home there, and for whom a man like Albert represents both the ultimate forbidden fruit and the single thing from which she cannot turn. There's a second woman, too, a Palestinian woman with whom Albert has a relationship after his affair with Golda ends. The book covers time from the early 1930s through 1948 and ranges from a kibbutz to the city but rests largely in the minds of its characters.

Certainly identity and it malleability, the way we put it on like clothes and wear it into the world, is a central theme of the book. Other themes include individual versus group identity, adherence to convention and the power of passion to challenge our ideas about ourselves. The Palestinian Lover also figures as an example of Europa Editions' mission to bring important Arabic literature to Europe and America. Unfortunately it's out of print now but I hope that readers interested in the Middle East and Israel will keep an eye out for this fascinating and important novel.

It's my third for the 2014 Europa Challenge.


Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: IN THE ORCHARD, THE SWALLOWS, by Peter Hobbs

In the Orchard, The Swallows, by Peter Hobbs. Published 2014 by Europa Editions. Literary Fiction.

In the Orchard, The Swallows, is a slim, lyrical book that can be read in a sitting or two, about a young man released from a Pakistani prison after more than a decade. Now, the boy he was gone, and the man he could have been ceased to exist, he must figure out who he is and how he will survive, not just day to day but how to make a life when everything about himself has been shattered, reformed and remade.

Peter Hobbs writes the book as a series of letters to Saba, the girl he knew and the inadvertent cause of his imprisonment. The two were infatuated with each other as teens though separated by custom and class. Her father has the boy arrested and sent away, and the boy stays in prison for years, becoming a man. Then one day, just like that, he's released and dumped by the side of the road. He makes his way back home and a kindly neighbor takes him in and takes care of him, until he's ready to begin taking care of himself.

He has a long way to go, and Hobbs makes no bones about the abuse he's suffered and the difficulty of his recovery in both physical and psychological terms. But there's hope, and there's a future, even if he doesn't quite know what that future will hold. I would recommend In the Orchard for readers of Atiq Rahimi and Khaled Hosseini. It's a little gem.

It's my second book for the 2014 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BUY

FTC Disclosure: I received this book for review from Europa Editions.

Review: SAVING MOZART, by Raphael Jerusalmy

Saving Mozart, by Raphael Jerusalmy. Published 2013 by Europa Editions. Literary fiction. Translation.

Saving Mozart is a short, epistolary novel made up of the journals and letters of Otto Steiner, an elderly music critic slowly dying of tuberculosis in a nursing home in Germany between 1939 and 1940. He is a non-practicing Jew and lives in constant anxiety of being found out, but he has a lot of other problems besides that, including deteriorating finances, worsening living conditions, the death of friends and crumbling health. The only thing that keeps him going is music- his records and phonograph, his memories of music and his ability to participate in public musical life.

His friend Hans is his link to the outside world, and when the book opens Steiner is still able to attend concerts and publish articles but over time he becomes more and more isolated. His isolation is reflected conversely in his living conditions; as he becomes more cut off financially and socially from the outside world he transitions from a bed in a single room to one in a shared ward. Introverts like Steiner can be alone in a room full of people and most fully connected to themselves when by themselves.

Above all though Steiner loves music and the music of Mozart most of all. So he is naturally very upset to learn that Mozart's music will be featured at an annual concert that will also function as a propaganda opportunity for the Nazis whom Steiner detests. And so he comes up with a way to make a very public statement at this event, a statement which may go undetected by the very people it was meant to show up, but not by all.

Saving Mozart is a quick read about a topic familiar to many readers but it is an original take on the subject at the same time. I enjoyed the suspense as events lead up to the concert, and the suspense over the changes in Otto's life and fate. It is a moving testimony to an act of rebellion and the refusal of one person to be cowed by or submit to cruelty and horror. Jerusalmy keeps us tottering on a precipice. We know what could happen, what is happening in the background. The musicians play not as Rome burns but as people do.

Rating: BACKLIST

This is my first book for the 2014 Europa Challenge. Want to join?

FTC Disclosure: I received this book for review from Europa Editions.