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- €4.99
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- €4.99
Publisher Description
Eighteen-year old orphan Andrea moves to battle-scarred Barcelona to take up a scholarship at the university.
But staying with relatives in their crumbling apartment, her dreams of independence are dashed among the eccentric collection of misfits who surround her, not least her uncle Roman. As Andrea's university friend, the affluent, elegant Ena, enters into a strange relationship with Roman, Andrea can't help but wonder what future lies ahead for her in such a bizarre and disturbing world.
'A really extraordinary novel . . . as a representation of what it’s like to live inside catastrophe and chaos and intense isolation, I think it’s quite close to unmatched’ - Katie Kitamura, Booker-shortlisted author of Audition
'One of the great classics of contemporary European literature' - Carlos Ruiz Zafon, author of The Shadow of the Wind
Translated by Edith Grossman
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Available in English for the first time in the U.S., Laforet's moody and sepulchral debut novel, a 1945 Spanish cult classic, has been given new life by acclaimed translator Grossman. The story follows 18-year-old Andrea as she spends a year with crazy relatives in a squalid, ramshackle townhouse on Calle de Aribau in post "civil war Barcelona. Although Andrea is young, she isn't adventurous or carefree like others her age, and much of the action takes place within her extended family's dank flat or along the melancholic city streets immediately surrounding it. But the narrative is no less interesting because of this, as it leaves plenty of room for the larger-than-life characters that occupy the house to fully flex their gross vitality and charming decrepitude. The violent Uncle Juan and his manic wife, Aunt Gloria; the crusty, devilish, magnetic violinist, Uncle Rom n; insanely embittered Aunt Angustias; and an oblivious, antiquated grandmother all offer up their own chaotic storylines, while perfectly balancing Andrea's stoic, ruminative personality. To compliment their frenetic vignettes, Andrea's narration is gorgeously expressive, rippling with emotion and meaning. U.S.-bound fans of European lit will welcome this Spanish gothic to the States with open arms and a half-exasperated, What took you so long?
