first this book was hard for me to get into, I think due to the history references that I wasn't familiar with, to setup the background, Once the stage is set, it's a great story! Definitely kept me intrigued and smiling at the end! On one hand, I'm sort of a sucker for the small mountain town deal.
On the other, in terms of solid characterization, people who talk like actual people, things like that Not so much, An awardwinning journalist transforms his lifelong fascination with the world of the Gypsies into fiction with this exuberant, deeply enchanting debut novelboth whimsical and suspensefulwinner of the European Book Prize, and translated into more than a dozen languages worldwide.
November: As Communism spreads across Eastern Europe, strange events are beginning to upend daily life in Baia Luna, a tiny village nestled at the foot of the Carpathian Mountains.
As the Soviets race to reach the moon and Sputnik soars overhead, fifteenyearold Pavel Botev attends the small village school with the other children, Their sole teacher, the mysterious and once beautiful Angela Barbulescu, was sent by the Ministry of Education, and while it is suspected that she has lived a highly cultured life, much of her past remains hidden.
But one day, after asking Pavel to help hang a photo of the new party secretary, she whispers a startling directive in his ear: "Send this man straight to hell! Exterminate him!" By the next morning, she has disappeared.
With little more to go on than the gossip and rumors swirling through his grandfather Ilja's tavern, Pavel finds curiosity overcoming his fear when suddenly the village's sacred Madonna statue is stolen and the priest Johannes Baptiste is found brutally murdered in the rectory.
Aided by the Gypsy girl Buba and her eccentric uncle, Dimitru Gabor, Pavel's search for answers leads him far from the innocent concerns of childhood and into the frontiers of a new world, changing his life forever.
Forse anche/divertente, ironico, bello a tratti, Ma eccessivo. Non c'è niente da fare, sono troppo vittoriana, troppo "naturalistica"!!! Unique storyline, Tough to rate. More a I haven't been in the "need to read" mode so this was perfect, Enjoyed the slow pace and quirkiness, This book was hard for me to get into, Not too terribly crazy about it, but it was free to me from Goodreads and looked like a good read, so I gave it a try, Just too hard for me to get into, and too hard to decipher on the English barrier, Nice try, though. Thank you Goodreads for this book as it was a free book from a Goodreads giveway, Je leeft mee in dit kleine dorpje in Roemenië Ho preso questo libro attratta esclusivamente dal titolo credendo fosse un romanzo in chiave ironica, Non potevo essere più in errore,
Sullo sfondo di un Unione Sovietica in procinto di allargare i suoi influssi negli stati satellite, la Romania in questo caso, e avviare il processo di collettivizzazione, si svolge la vita di Pavel.
Il quindicenne abitante di uno sperduto villaggio transmontano si trova presto a doversi confrontare con lo strapotere di personaggi intenti nella scalata al potere,
Scene divertenti si intersecano con la cruda realtà dei tempi dove una prospettata “Età dellOro” sfocerà in una sanguinosa rivoluzione,
Consigliato a tutti gli amanti di romanzi di ambientazione storica, contemporanea in questo caso, For some reason, this book reminds me of Herman Hesse's "Peter Camenzind" even though I haven't read that book in nearlyyears, Like a mix of Peter Camenzind and
Don Quixote, Though the blurb makes this book out to be about gypsies, their plight or lives are really not a part of the book, though one of them is a main character, this book is not about Gypsies really in any way but that they are human and are at the whim of history like anyone else.
This story takes place in a small village in a fictitious Eastern European country in the Carpathians, The village is a petrie dish of humanity that doesn't seem to be touched as much by the events and history of the communist world during the cold war, The lesson primarily being taught is futility and the passage of time erodes everything, but this is a complicated book featuring people of great worth and people who are weak and people who are of little worth and basically are just evil and enjoy hurting people after they've used them up.
I think the message I'm going to take away is that life is fleeting and one must grab at it and make it the best one can or it will slide away from you and you will end up with just dust.
The story is well written, or I should at least say well translated, It definitely is written from an Eastern European standpoint that may seem odd to Westerners, The characters are complicated and seem to fit into their world which is rather grim with poverty and pastorialism and the threat of losing the little livelihood that they have to communism.
The mystery of Angela Barbulescu almost enables Pavel to rise above the drab and dreary early communism to turn the world on it's head, but he doesn't seem to have the strength to quite rise above, he struggles but then seems to sink into the normality of country life.
This book is bizarre as a quote calls it, but only in the efforts of some people to find answers to why life is what it is, It has it's slow spots and is not perfect, but well worth the read, Bauerdick kan meesterlijk vertellen! Ik heb van dit boek genoten,
Het boek opent met de executie van het echtpaar Ceauşecu en een arts die daarbij betrokken was, Hierna worden er pas zaken opgelost die inin gang zijn gezet: Pavelwoont in een knus Roemeens dorpje, De een is er katholiek en de ander socialist en dan zijn er behalve Roemenen ook nog een paar Duitsers en Hongaren en een groep zigeuners, Alleen dankzij de pastoor loopt het er niet uit de hand, Wat ook leeft in het dorpje is als de Russen inde Spoetnik met Laika lanceren, Dan kunnen Pavel's opa en zijn beste vriend maarreden bedenken waarom ze dat nou zouden doen: volgens Openbaring staat Maria op de maan, en volgens de pastoor is Maria met lichaam en ziel in de hemel opgenomen, dus de Russen zoeken haar natuurlijk! Dan wordt de pastoor vermoord, verdwijnt de dorpslerares en komt de Securitate het dorp binnen.
. . One of my favorite thing about all books is the way you can be immersed in a completely different world regardless of your own surrounds, Buses filled with people, noisy people outside or even your daunting todo list all melt away for as long as you can let them, And with an evergrowing To Be Read pile, I have in the last few years adhered to the fifty page rule, If a book doesnt hook me within its first fifty pages, I set it aside, This usually happens about three or four times a year, and this book marks the third and hopefully last book ofthat I could not bring myself to finish, Like Kent Wascoms sitelinkThe Blood of Heaven and A, L. Kennedys sitelinkThe Blue Book, even getting to that fifty page mark became something of a struggle,
Perhaps my frustration with the novel lies at the feet of the translator, Originally written in German, this English version uses words in the rambling prose that greatly contrast with the clearer language in its dialogue, Though not all blame should be placed on the translator, The concept of a fictional country set in the Cold Warera somewhere in the Transylvanian Mountains is disorienting with real, authentic facts and locales mentioned alongside this faux background, Marketed as a comingofage novel, its overall pointofview is that of an older Pavel looking back on these events, which really takes away from that “comingofage” feel, This coupled with an inconsistent verb tense, an entire village of characters all shallowly described and the odd use of vocabulary all make this book difficult to connect with on any level.
Maybe someday I will try this one again it certainly seems to have received some rave reviews from other readers but for now, I just cant make myself look at it.
Avevo questo libro in casa dalma pareva non arrivasse mai il momento giusto per iniziarlo, pensare che l'avevo comprato dicendomi 'con una copertina e un titolo del genere non può non piacermi'.
E quando finalmente è arrivato il suo momento, così è stato,
Certo, non riesco a ricordarmi di aver mai letto un libro con una sequenza di teorie così bislacche, ma la perseveranza di Pavel nel portare avanti l'opera di riscatto dell'onore della maestra Barbulescu ha veramente dell'incredibile.
Non sonostelle piene solo perché ho trovato il finale forse un pochino affrettato, ma per il resto chapeau all'autore per aver saputo tessere una storia così complessa senza cadere nell'assurdo.
Folle sì, ma con stile, De opening van dit boek klinkt als een aflevering van Midsomer Murders: een dorpspriester wordt vermoord aangetroffen en vlak daarna verdwijnt een lerares op mysterieuze wijze, Alleen speelt dit alles zich af in een bergdorpje, diep in de Roemeense Karpaten, Hier woont een curieuze mengeling van Duitsers, Hongaren, Roemenen en zigeuners, die elkaar het liefst in de haren vliegen, Het verhaal begint in de jaren vijftig, als zelfs in dit afgelegen gebied het communisme begint door te dringen, Dat de gebeurtenissen rondom de priester en de lerares iets met de communisten te maken hebben beseft al gauw iedereen, De oplossing van dit mysterie zal echter pas vele jaren later duidelijk worden, na de val van Ceauşescu, De tussenliggende periode weet Bauerdick met veel vaart te beschrijven, Hij zet de verschillen tussen alle figuren in het dorp lekker vet aan en laat op hilarische wijze zien wat de onafwendbare moderniteit voor deze mensen betekent, Het levert een smakelijk boek op,
sitelinkLees hier meer van mijn besprekingen,