FEATURING NOBEL PRIZE WINNER OLGA TOKARCZUK’S FIRST WORK IN ENGLISH

What do we mean by small town?

How has this innocuous term one up from village, a couple down from city come to function as a pejorative?

Pressed to describe what the phrase small town conjures up, wed be hard pushed to say anything positive: closed-minded; petty; provincial; parochial. On a broad European canvas, however, the rich traditions of short story writing challenge these preconceptions.

The stories collected here are neither narrow-minded nor petty, nor do the minds of their protagonists contract to fit their environment. In Germany, a house-husband is slowly sent over the edge by his over-achieving neighbours. In the town of Odda in Norway, a middle-aged Morrissey fan has a matter of hours to find a girlfriend so his ailing mother can die in peace. Its the small gestures a white lie, the turning of a blind eye, a small kindness or a secret kept that allow the characters of these communities to survive, to breathe easily within the seemingly tight strictures life there can impose. Its how we do things round here…

Format: Paperback
Published: USA, 2007
Publisher: Comma Press
Pages: 128
Language: English
ISBN 10: 1905583133
ISBN 13: 9781905583133