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Author Archives: palquist
Review: The Vegetarian by Han Kang
Review: The Vegetarian by Han Kang, translated by Deborah Smith
I loved The Vegetarian by Han Kang (and translated by the phenomenal Deborah Smith). It is a beautiful and unsettling story about a woman, Yeong-hye, who begins to have horrible nightmares—of blood and carnage—and in order to clear her mind and rid herself of these dreams becomes a vegetarian. The story becomes one of control and power as her husband and family try to break her back into submission. To further emphasize her lack of control, Yeong-hye’s own story is even told by others, in three parts, first by her husband, then her brother-in-law, and finally by her sister. It’s a dark and fascinating book and I can’t recommend it enough, especially if you enjoyed Nowhere to Be Found by Bae Suah. It’s my pick for the Man Book International Prize for this year.
BTBA Longlist
The Best Translated Book Award longlist has been announced and Three Percent has been busily publishing the “Why This Book Should Win” series highlighting each book individually. I highly recommend paying attention to the series, it’s a great discovery tool and this year’s list is especially strong. I’ve included more information below but I’ve also got a couple guesses about what books will be vying for the top spots (in no particular order):
- Nowhere to Be Found by Bae Suah, translated from the Korean by Sora Kim-Russell (South Korea, AmazonCrossing)
- The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante, translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein (Italy, Europa Editions)
- Sphinx by Anne Garréta, translated from the French by Emma Ramadan (France, Deep Vellum)
- The Physics of Sorrow by Georgi Gospodinov, translated from the Bulgarian by Angela Rodel (Bulgaria, Open Letter)
- Beauty Is a Wound by Eka Kurniawan, translated from the Indonesian by Annie Tucker (Indonesia, New Directions)
- The Complete Stories by Clarice Lispector, translated from the Portuguese by Katrina Dodson (Brazil, New Directions)
- The Story of My Teeth by Valeria Luiselli, translated from the Spanish by Christina MacSweeney (Mexico, Coffee House Press)
- Tram 83 by Fiston Mwanza Mujila, translated from the French by Roland Glasser (Democratic Republic of the Congo, Deep Vellum)
- One Out of Two by Daniel Sada, translated from the Spanish by Katherine Silver (Mexico, Graywolf Press)
- War, So Much War by Mercè Rodoreda, translated from the Catalan by Maruxa Relaño and Martha Tennent (Spain, Open Letter)
It’s here! The twenty-five best translations of 2015 according to our esteemed panel of judges. As mentioned in the earlier post, we will be highlighting each of these titles on the site starting this afternoon, and finishing just in time for the April 19th announcement of the ten finalists.
The winners will be announced on May 4th at 7pm both on The Millions website and live in person at The Folly (92 West Houston, New York).
Before getting into the books, I want to praise our group of judges one more time. This is a huge undertaking and they’ve done a marvelous job reading dozens and dozens of books and winnowing down all that was published last year into this stunningly good longlist. This year’s judges are: Amanda Bullock (Literary Arts, Portland), Heather Cleary, translator from the Spanish, co-founder of the Buenos Aires Review), Kevin Elliott (57th Street Books), Kate Garber (192 Books), Jason Grunebaum (translator from the Hindi, writer), Mark Haber (writer,Brazos Bookstore), Stacey Knecht (translator from Czech and Dutch), Amanda Nelson (Book Riot), and P.T. Smith (writer and reader).
Here’s the longlist!
Three Percent & My Latest Review
Three Percent is the translation blog hosted by Open Letter Books—it’s one of the best around for books and news in the translation world (and wider!) I’ve got my latest review on the site below:
The latest addition to our Reviews section is by Pierce Alquist on Nowhere to Be Found by Bae Suah, published in 2014 by AmazonCrossing.
Just a side note, that if you’ve been itching for more from Bae Suah since this one came out, there are THREE more forthcoming titles of hers making their way into English: A Greater Music (Open Letter, October 2016), Recitation (Deep Vellum, 2016), and The Owls’ Absence (Open Letter, ~2018), all three in translation by Deborah Smith. So get your reading hats on, because it’s about to get amazing out here.
Here’s the beginning of Pierce’s review:
It’s been almost a year since the publication of Nowhere to Be Found by Bae Suah, but despite being included on the 2015PEN Translation award longlist, and some pretty vocal support from key indie presses, the book has been widely overlooked. I’ve found this to be largely because Nowhere to Be Found is published by AmazonCrossing.
If you’ve overlooked Bae Suah out of some desire to punish Amazon, or because of a general indifference to the AmazonCrossing imprint, you’re only doing yourself a disservice. With three upcoming books translated into English—_A Greater Music_, The Owls’ Absence, and _Recitation_—Bae Suah will continue to establish herself as one of the hottest voices coming out of South Korea. list: Books from Korea named her as “one of the most risk-taking, experimental writers active in Korea”—and with the fiction that is coming out of South Korea right now (see: Han Kang and others), that is high praise.
For the rest of the review, go here.
Man Booker 2016 Longlist Announced
The Man Booker International Prize 2016 Longlist was announced this week and the list is insane! The selections are incredibly on point, featuring the really exciting and dynamic work of Han Kang (review of The Vegetarian to come!), Fiston Mwanza Mujila, and Eka Kurniawan. I highly recommend Tram 83 from Deep Vellum, a new translation press that’s doing really great stuff. The heavy hitters are here too (Elena Ferrante if you haven’t heard of her) but they’ve got some strong competition.
From their website:
“The Man Booker International Prize is delighted to reveal the ‘Man Booker Dozen’ of 13 books in contention for the 2016 Prize, celebrating the finest in global fiction.
This is the first longlist ever to have been announced for the Man Booker International Prize, which has joined forces with theIndependent Foreign Fiction Prize and is now awarded annually on the basis of a single book. The £50,000 prize will be divided equally between the author of the winning book and its translator. The judges considered 155 books.
José Eduardo Agualusa (Angola) Daniel Hahn, A General Theory of Oblivion (Harvill Secker)
Elena Ferrante (Italy) Ann Goldstein, The Story of the Lost Child (Europa Editions)
Han Kang (South Korea) Deborah Smith, The Vegetarian (Portobello Books)
Maylis de Kerangal (France) Jessica Moore, Mend the Living (Maclehose Press)
Eka Kurniawan (Indonesia) Labodalih Sembiring, Man Tiger (Verso Books)
Yan Lianke (China) Carlos Rojas, The Four Books (Chatto & Windus)
Fiston Mwanza Mujila (Democratic Republic of Congo/Austria) Roland Glasser, Tram 83 (Jacaranda)
Raduan Nassar (Brazil) Stefan Tobler, A Cup of Rage (Penguin Modern Classics)
Marie NDiaye (France) Jordan Stump, Ladivine (Maclehose Press)
Kenzaburō Ōe (Japan) Deborah Boliner Boem, Death by Water (Atlantic Books)
Aki Ollikainen (Finland) Emily Jeremiah & Fleur Jeremiah, White Hunger (Peirene Press)
Orhan Pamuk (Turkey) Ekin Oklap, A Strangeness in My Mind (Faber & Faber)
Robert Seethaler (Austria) Charlotte Collins, A Whole Life (Picador)
“Reader, I murdered him.”
I love riffs and reimagining of the classic novels. From Pride and Prejudice and Zombies to Jane Slayre and Longbourn—nothing is too much! Spring 2016 seems to be full of them, particularly new adaptations of Brontë and Austen. Does anyone have a favorite adaptation of a classic novel? I’d love recommendations!
Best Books of 2015
I’ve picked my top three books published in 2015 (US release)—it was a labor of love narrowing it down to three! (One work of nonfiction, one work of fiction, and a cookbook to round it out.)
#24in48
This is my second year doing #24in48 (where you read for 24 hours in a 48 hour period. I usually do it over a weekend so as to not kill myself!) I love doing a combination of books, things I’ve had on my TBR list for a while, finishing up books I’ve been slowly working through, and I’ll always throw something new into the mix! Here’s what I read:
- Not That Kind of Girl by Lena Dunham (I was not a huge fan, but I do appreciate Dunham’s honesty and approach to this pseudo-memoir. )
- Library of Souls by Ransom Riggs (A longer review of this series to come!)
- Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame (I’d never read it and it was such a delightful collection of stories for children!)
- Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And other concerns) by Mindy Kaling (I loved this one. And started right away on her second.)
All of the Alice
November marks the 150th anniversary of the publication of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, which helps to explain the abundance of new Alice books! (Publishers love anniversaries) Here are a few that I’ve read or am looking forward to reading:
Cranberry Bogging!
To top off a beautiful autumnal weekend with my mom in Boston, we went cranberry bogging! Mayflower Cranberries in Plympton, Massachusetts has a “Be the Grower” experience package where you can actually put on some waders and help rake in the cranberries. It was a beautiful day and we had so much fun!
Pierce Alquist 