Centroeuropa
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE
Revelations—and frozen corpses—multiply in a small, European village
“Male, Prussian, hussar soldier, frozen. That was the first body I found while digging in the frozen earth to bury my wife.”
At the dawn of the nineteenth century, European feudalism is starting to crumble. Newly widowed, Redo Hauptshammer arrives in a small town far from home to claim a plot of arable land and the simple life of a farmer. But when Redo begins to dig up the field, the perfectly preserved, frozen corpse of a soldier emerges. The next day, Redo uncovers two more soldiers, dressed in uniforms of an earlier age. And then there are more.
As bodies from past and future wars proliferate exponentially, Redo enlists the aid of eccentric villagers, but risks exposing a precious personal secret and the great love at the heart of it. What will be excavated and what will remain buried?
Subtle, subversive, and full of surprises, this ingeniously structured novel heralds a talented writer whose experimentations in style are as dazzling as his humane, spirited story of oppression, erasure, and endurance.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Mora's clever U.S. debut, a small Prussian village is upended in the early 19th century by the discovery of numerous corpses buried on a new arrival's plot of land. Redo Haupstshammer travels with his wife, Odra, to Szonden with the intention of settling down for good. Odra dies on the journey, however, and when Redo attempts to bury her on his property, he unearths the body of a Prussian soldier; a few days later, he finds two Napoleonic soldiers buried together. Redo digs up more than a dozen additional bodies, all of which are completely frozen and will not thaw. While waiting for local authorities to figure out how to handle the situation, Redo becomes increasingly frustrated by his inability to work his land, or even bury Odra. Mora populates the narrative with a cast of memorable characters, including a mysterious witch and a giant named Udo, whom bees won't sting, on the way to a last act that features both nightmarish imagery and a stirring finale. The result will appeal to readers who like their historical novels with an eccentric twist and a dash of Nabokovian playfulness.
Customer Reviews
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Excellent a dash of magical realism and history in post feudal rural Prussia in the 1820’s