12/14/2020
At the start of this evocative work of magic realism from Dragomán (The White King), 13-year-old Emma, who’s been living since the death of her parents in an orphanage in an unnamed city and country that’s recently overthrown its Communist government, is claimed by a grandmother she didn’t know existed. The grandmother convinces Emma with a bit of magic that they’re related. At her grandmother’s house, Emma regularly observes and participates in minor bits of domestic magic, such as interacting with her grandfather’s ghost and engaging in homely rituals. At school, she faces mean girls as she tries to find where she fits in, eventually becoming part of the long-distance running team. Some accuse her grandfather of having been an informer for the previous regime, but others dismiss that as nonsense. Below the surface, violence is still simmering from the revolution that could strike close to Emma. One small incident follows another until some dramatic action in the final pages. The striking mix of magical elements and post-Communist setting compensates for the lack of much of a plot. Fans of Gabriel García Márquez may want to have a look. Agent: Chris Parris-Lamb, Gernert Company. (Feb.)
A New York Times Editors' Choice Finalist for the Prix du Meilleur LivreÉtranger (France) Finalist for the Premio von Rezzori (Italy) Long-listed for the Prix Femina (France) "[The Bone Fire] achieves a disconcerting juxtaposition of the mundane and the primeval. On one level, it’s a real-world coming-of-age story, in which a teenager navigates both post-Communist aftershocks and the more personal issues of menstruation, crushes, friendships and bathing suits — and on another, it’s a tale of magic, ghosts and ancient memory . . . The timing is perfect: The novel reaches an American audience at a moment when we’re feeling not only the seismic shifts of historical change, and the hard reckoning after a strongman’s fall, but also the ways magical thinking, conspiracy and rumor seep through the cracks during times of turmoil . . . This is a story, after all, in which dreams and phantasms are kinder and more sensical than the random brutality of the concrete world. To that end, his telling is not just magic, but enchantment." —Rebecca Makkai, New York Times Book Review “Anything can happen in The Bone Fire—and everything does. Dragomán puts us in the middle of our most wondrous and terrifying childhood fairytales, somehow unhazing their dreaminess and replicating their electrifying uncertainty all at once.” —Téa Obreht, bestselling author of Inland and The Tiger's Wife "The Bone Fire exposes the magic and mystery behind so much of what we accept in our lives to be fact: that parents die, that children grow up, that regimes change, that we keep going. It traces, thanks to György Dragomán's deft hand, in Ottilie Mulzet's careful, confident translation, the places where fairy tale lands and post-Soviet territories meet. It is as sinister as it is stunningly beautiful. It is the work of a master." —Julia Phillips, author of Disappearing Earth "Nested in this novel’s magical setting is the darkly-glinting stone of a turbulent political history of secrets, betrayals, ghosts, and memory. Dragomán’s exigent concerns, his transitionless subject-verb-object sentences, and his terrific gift for sensual details give this book its breathless, detective-fiction-like pacing. It will pierce you like a knitting needle. " —Forrest Gander, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and author of Twice Alive "A poignant coming-of-age tale set against the backdrop of regime change." —Kirkus Reviews "[An] evocative work of magic realism... Fans of Gabriel García Márquez may want to have a look." —Publishers Weekly —
Narrator Caitlin Kelly’s youthful-sounding voice is perfect for this novel about 13-year-old Emma, who lives in an orphanage in an unnamed former communist country. Out of the blue, a mysterious older woman who is claiming to be her grandmother takes Emma away. Then magic subtly begins to enter Emma’s new life. Kelly conveys Emma’s childlike wonder at the changes she experiences. She also captures Emma’s wisdom beyond her years with an occasional wry twist in her voice at the end of a phrase or a slightly lower pitch when she mentions something unbelievable. This entertaining combination of an engaging performance and great storytelling will appeal to many listeners. D.G.P. © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine
Narrator Caitlin Kelly’s youthful-sounding voice is perfect for this novel about 13-year-old Emma, who lives in an orphanage in an unnamed former communist country. Out of the blue, a mysterious older woman who is claiming to be her grandmother takes Emma away. Then magic subtly begins to enter Emma’s new life. Kelly conveys Emma’s childlike wonder at the changes she experiences. She also captures Emma’s wisdom beyond her years with an occasional wry twist in her voice at the end of a phrase or a slightly lower pitch when she mentions something unbelievable. This entertaining combination of an engaging performance and great storytelling will appeal to many listeners. D.G.P. © AudioFile 2021, Portland, Maine
2020-11-27
A widow and an orphan seek solace in each other’s company.
Thirteen-year-old Emma was raised to believe her mother had no living relatives, but six months after a car accident kills her parents, her maternal grandmother arrives at the orphanage to claim her. Emma is initially dubious, but the unnamed woman explains she and her daughter had a falling out long ago, and she only recently learned of Emma’s existence. Fate brought them together, she insists, as she, too, has been alone since her husband died during the bloody political revolution that ravaged their unidentified Eastern European nation. Emma can’t deny the family resemblance, so she packs her bags and lets the old lady take her home. There, she meets the ghost of her grandfather; learns the mystical, old-world ways of her grandmother; and grapples with the difficult truths of her family’s fraught history. Hungarian author Dragomán employs elements of magical realism to literalize the power inherent in superstition and ritual. Contrasting narrative styles illustrate the strikingly different manners in which the two characters process their respective traumas. Emma’s first-person-present narration holds the reader at a remove, echoing her own sense of detachment, while her grandmother’s tales of World War II unfold in the second-person-present, reflecting her inability to move on. Discursive plotting allows Dragomán to draw parallels between Emma’s adolescent growing pains and those felt by her country as it tries to rebuild itself in the wake of communism’s collapse.
A poignant coming-of-age tale set against the backdrop of regime change.
