Verena Reichel Knihy

Was macht ein junger amerikanischer Rabbiner, mit dem Zug unterwegs von Stockholm nach Paris, wenn er zufällig in den Besitz einer Mikrokassette mit dem Steuerungsprogramrn für eine Mittelstreckenrakete gelangt? Während unsereiner das Ding entweder wegwerfen oder bei der Polizei abgeben würde, faßt der patriotische Bernard Foy den riskanten Plan, die Rakete umzuprogrammieren, damit sie künftig ihre Erfinder hinter dem Eisernen Vorhang belästige... Das ist natürlich nicht einfach, zumal dem mehr oder weniger rechtmäßigen Besitzer dieser Kassette alles daran liegt, die Kostbarkeit wieder an sich zu bringen. Eine fıeberhaftejagd durch Europa und Amerika beginnt, an der so unterschiedliche Persönlichkeiten wie der deutsche Verteidigungsminister, sinistre Zwerge, zweifelhafte Damen und ein alter Nazi teilnehmen. Wer, fragt sich der Leser, mag wohl hinter einem solch abgefeirnten Kornplott stecken? Lars Gustafsson hat mit diesem phantastischen Roman, in dem es von Einfällen, Ideen und unerwarteten Echos nur so wimmelt, eine Methode entwickelt, der Realität ihr Geheimnis zu entreißen: Bodenlosigkeit.

Lonely and introspective, Doctor Glas has long felt an instinctive hostility toward the odious local minister. When the minister's beautiful wife complains of her husband's oppressive sexual attention, Doctor Glas finds himself contemplating murder

Caldwell lives by the lakeside at Austin, Texas, with his wife of thirty years. He is a judge in the Federal Bankruptcy Court. And the dog? A mongrel that kept upsetting his dustbins as it rooted about in them, until the judge went after it and secretly beat its brains out with the edge-trimmers.

Once a successful surgeon, Frederick Welin now lives in self-imposed exile on an island in the Swedish archipelago. Nearly twelve years have passed since he was disgraced for attempting to cover up a tragic mishap on the operating table. One morning in the depths of winter, he sees a hunched figure struggling towards him across the ice. His past is about to catch up with him. The figure approaching in the freezing cold is Harriet, the only woman he has ever loved, the woman he abandoned in order to go and study in America forty years earlier. She has sought him out in the hope that he will honour a promise made many years ago. Now in the late stages of a terminal illness, she wants to visit a small lake in northern Sweden, a place Welin's father took him once as a boy. He upholds his pledge and drives her to this beautiful pool hidden deep in the forest. On the journey through the desolate snow-covered landscape, Welin reflects on his impoverished childhood and the woman he later left behind. However, once there Welin discovers that Harriet has left the biggest surprise until last. Italian Shoes is as compelling as it is disturbing. Through his anti-hero Welin, Mankell tackles ageing and death with sensitivity and acuity, and as with the critically acclaimed Depths, delivers a moving tour-de-force on the frailty of mankind.

Suspense fiction. A tense and gripping psychological thriller: Mankell's best book yet.

Andersson, bedeutender Vertreter der schwedischen Gegenwartsliteratur, erzählt die Geschichte von Emil Thorelius, die die Entstehung der Sozialdemokratie in Schweden widerspiegelt.