Per Petterson Knihy

V jedno skoré ráno sa na moste stretnú dvaja muži. Pred tridsiatimi piatimi rokmi boli najlepšími priateľmi. V tom čase Tommyho a jeho sestru opustila matka a neskôr aj ich násilnícky otec. Jim, ktorý žil sám so svojou pobožnou mamou, odišiel na univerzitu a stal sa socialistom. A teraz, po toľkých rokoch Jim stojí na moste a chytá ryby, zatiaľ čo Tommy prechádza popri ňom vo svojom drahom mercedese. Petterson vo viacerých románových líniách rozpráva o životných zvratoch oboch mužov nielen od osudového stretnutia na moste, ale zo súčasnosti plynulo prechádza do minulosti a nadväzuje líniou spomienok na ich detstvo a mladosť, ktorú náhodné stretnutie opäť oživilo.

Po smrti manželky sa šesťdesiatsedemročný Trond Sander presťahuje do opusteného domu pri jazere. Jednej novembrovej noci sa objaví jeho sused, starší muž, ktorý žije rovnako ako on celkom sám so svojím psom. Keď sa predstaví, Trond v ňom spozná mladšieho brata svojho kamaráta z detstva Jona a v jeho spomienkach zrazu ožíva dávna minulosť. Nórsky spisovateľ Per Petterson získal v roku 2006 za tento román cenu denníka "Independent" v kategórii prekladová literatúra. V roku 2007 mu udelili Dublinskú literárnu cenu IMPAC, najvyššie dotované literárne ocenenie v Európe.

I was fourteen and a half when the Germans came. On that 9th April we woke to the roar of aeroplanes swooping so low over the roofs of the town that we could see the black iron crosses painted on the underside of their wings when we leaned out of the windows and looked up. In this exquisite novel, readers will find the crystalline prose and depth of feeling they adored in Out Stealing Horses , a literary sensation of 2007. A brother and sister are forced ever more closely together after the suicide of their grandfather. Their parents' neglect leaves them wandering the streets of their small Danish village. The sister dreams of escaping to Siberia, but it seems increasingly distant as she helplessly watches her brother become more and more involved in resisting the Nazis.

As he attempts to negotiate the present, he remembers holidays on the beach with his brothers, his early working life devoted to Communist ideals, courtship, and his relationship with his tough, independent mother - a relationship full of distance and unspoken pain that is central to Arvid's life.

A major new novel from the author of the international bestseller Out Stealing Horses. Men in My Situation is a tender, scintillating portrait of grief, fatherhood and a life nearly going to pieces. In 1992 Arvid Jansen is thirty-eight and divorced. Turid has left with their three girls, slipping into her young, exuberant crowd of friends - the colourful - and a new house with no trace of their previous life together. More than a year has passed since the tragic accident that took his parents and two of his brothers. Existence has become a question of holding on to a few firm things. Loud, smoky bars, whisky, records, company for the night and taxis home. Or driving his Mazda into the stunning, solitary landscape outside of Oslo, sleeping in the car when his bed is an impossible place to be, craving a connection that is always just beyond reach. At some point, the girls decide against weekend visits with their dad. Arvid suspects that his eldest daughter, Vigdis, sees what kind of a man he really is. Adrift and inept, paralysed by grief. And maybe she's right to keep her distance from his lonely life. Is there any redemption for a man in his situation? When Arvid has lost or been left by all those dear to him and feels his life unravelling, perhaps there is still a way forward.

On his first day of school, a teacher welcomes Audun to the class by asking him to describe his former life in the country. But there are stories about his family he would prefer to keep to himself, such as the weeks he spent living in a couple of cardboard boxes, and the day of his little brother's birth, when his drunken father fired three shots into the ceiling. So he refuses to talk and refuses to take off his sunglasses. In his late teens Audun is the only one of his family who remains with his mother in their home in a working-class district of Oslo. He delivers newspapers when he is not in school and talks for hours about Jack London and Ernest Hemingway with his best friend Arvid. But he's not sure that school is the right path for him, feeling that life holds other possibilities.

I refuse to compromise. I refuse to forgive. I refuse to forget. The major new novel from the author of Out Stealing Horses. 'Tommy. How long have we been friends.' 'All of our lives,' Tommy said. 'I can't remember us ever not being friends. When would that have been.' Jim said. 'I think it could last the rest of our lives,' he said carefully, in a low voice. 'Don't you think.' 'It will last if we want it to. It depends on us. We can be friends for as long as we want to.' Tommy's mother has gone. She walked out into the snow one night, leaving him and his sisters with their violent father. Without his best friend Jim, Tommy would be in trouble. But Jim has challenges of his own which will disrupt their precious friendship. A TLS and Guardian Book of the Year

Early one morning Arvid finds himself standing outside the bookshop where he used to work, drunk, dirty, with two fractured ribs, and no idea how he came to be there.

Anticipating a divorce against a backdrop of the fall of communism, Arvid Jansen is further dismayed by his mother's diagnosis with cancer, a situation that prompts his emotionally charged quest for understanding and balance

Per Petterson masters the art of writing simply of big subjects, and the stories in this collection - his debut, published in English for the first time - are beautiful tales of growing up in all its complexity, its wonders and confusions. Arvid Jansen is six years old and lives on the outskirts of Oslo. It's the early 60s, and his father works in a shoe factory; his Danish mother works as a cleaner. Arvid wets his bed at night and has nightmares about crocodiles, but slowly begins to piece the world together. His grandfather dies and he cries on seeing a photograph of his mother as a young woman - learning about the passing of time and growing old; and the world opens up to him when a teacher at his school says he and his fellow pupils must pray to God over the looming nuclear war.