Open Letter: 64 books

"Karastoyanov's novel is set in Bulgaria in the 1920s, but also invokes the spirit of John Lennon, and brings to mind Dostoevsky's Demons with its anarchists and assassins, lighthouses, zeppelins, and synthesis of modernist narrative techniques and Balkan storytelling." —Berliner Zeitung In...

"Flawlessly translated, Amanda Michalopolou's WIKMBF uses the backdrop of Greek politics, radical protests, and the art world to explore the dangers and joys that come with BFFs. Or, as the narrator puts it, 'odiodsamato,' which translates roughly as 'frienemies.'"-Gary Shteyngart In...

WINNER OF THE 2013 CONTEMPORARY BULGARIAN WRITERS CONTEST Albena Stambolova's idiosyncratic debut novel, Everything Happens as It Does, builds from the idea that, as the title suggests, everything happens exactly the way it must. In this case, the seven characters of the novel-from Boris, a...

By blinking his eyes and moving his pupils, a paraplegic man—the onetime vocalist in a famous rock band—composes a kind of anti-biography that is corrected and expanded upon by an unknown editor. Alternating between the vocalist’s impressionistic recollections and the editor’s “corrections,”...

Melding Pynchon with the Beats, Pincio sends his heroes Jack Kerouac and Neal Cassady on a pulp sci-fi adventure in a satire of contemporary capitalism. Coca-Cola sells dreams and blames their customers for maiming caused by exploding bottles. Neal Cassady chases Marilyn Monroe. In Pincio’s 1950s, history is lost in fantasy, and the result is sheer entertainment.

"When Mondru's prose is ablaze, cruising around with her inside a bruised and beaten artist’s soul is a veritable party. . . . By God she's a great prose stylist full of character."-Politiken Danish Women Writers Series Stylistically provocative, Justine tells the story of...

CO-WINNER OF THE 2012 CONTEMPORARY BULGARIAN WRITERS CONTEST After deciding to take a semester off their studies to think about future plans, long-time friends Maya, Sirma, and Spartacus decide to hitchhike to the sea. Boril Krustev, former rock star and middle-aged widower who is driving aimlessly...

Each time protagonist Dami comes up with another one of his “great ideas,” he is instantly thwarted by his own body, overcome time and again by various, almost comical, ailments. Throughout the ups and downs of his health and the desire to find his professional calling, Dami must learn the greatest...