The Middlesteins

A Jewish Family in Chicago?

Good authors make you care about characters with whom you have nothing in common. Think Allison Johnson in Willy Vlautin's Northline, or Stoner in John William's eponymous novel.

I am only halfway through Jami Attenberg's The Middlesteins, but I am living alongside this family as they deal with divorce, ambition and a mother with an unhealthy relationship with food.

Yes, it's a dark novel, but it's funny too, and warm. A serious book that doesn't take itself too seriously. Jonathan Frazen said, "The Middlesteins had me from the very first page," and I have to agree. There is something delightfully dysfunctional about this family.

If you are looking for an engrossing summer read then look no further. 

The author, Jami Attenberg, will be appearing at the Morges Book Festival alongside other writers, such as Nathan Filer (The Shock of the Fall) and Sadie Jones (The Outcasts, Fallout). You can find ot more about the festival at www.lelivresurlesquais.ch. Personally, I can't wait!

New books set or written in Switzerland

The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair
Joel Dicker

For those of you who haven't heard of him, Jöel Dicker is a young author from Geneva who won numerous prizes for this book when it first appeared under the French title,
La Vérité sur l’Affaire Harry Quebert.

The book has now been translated into English and will be published in three weeks, so get your orders in now!

It tells the story of novelist Harry Quebert who, in 1975, fell in love with fifteen-year-old Nola Kellergan. Thirty-three years later, her body is dug up from his yard along with a manuscript copy of his career-defining novel. Quebert is the only suspect.

The book has been described as, "a brilliantly intricate murder mystery, a hymn to the boundless reaches of the imagination, and a love story like no other."

It will be available from your nearest and dearest independent bookshop from 2nd May.         

 

A Heart Bent Out of Shape
Emylia Hall

It's always fun to read a book set in the city where you live, particularly that feeling of knowing where the action is taking place. So I was delighted to hear about a new book set in Lausanne.

A Heart Bent out of Shape is set in, and I quote, "the glittering Swiss city of Lausanne, a place that feels alive with promise."

The story concerns Hadley Dunn who decides to spend a year studying at the English department at Lausanne University. Here Hadley meets Kristina, a beautiful but elusive Danish girl, and the two quickly form the strongest of bonds. Yet one November night, as the first snows of winter arrive, tragedy strikes.

Hadley, left reeling and guilt-stricken, begins to lean on the only other person to whom she feels close, her American Literature professor Joel Wilson. But as the pair try to uncover the truth of what happened that night, their tentative friendship heads into forbidden territory...


 The book is available now.