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Translation Prizes – The 2013 Best Translated Book Award
The 2013 Best Translated Book Award longlist contains 25 titles. In the coming weeks the Three Percent Blog will feature a review for every title that made the longlist, everyone interested in the...
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Black Bazaar by Alain Mabanckou, translated from the French by Sarah Ardizzone
Terroir in a novel, unless it’s a historical novel, isn’t always as important as we’d like to make it. The plot seldom hinges on it. What I mean is – for all the hype around Nordic Crime, change the...
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The Neruda Case by Roberto Ampuero (Carolina De Robertis, translator &...
The Neruda Case is the first book by Chilean author Roberto Ampuero to be translated into English. It’s in actuality the sixth book of his popular crime series featuring the Cuban private detective...
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IFFP & BTBA 2013 Short Lists – They’re Here!
The two translation prize shortlists are out – and it’s exciting to see how many different languages (and countries) are represented. I’ve still only read three of the books on the BTBA list – and of...
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Scars by Juan José Saer, translated from the original Spanish by Steve Dolph
Of all his novels and short stories, it is For Whom the Bell Tolls that showcases Ernest Hemingway’s signature brand of maudlin, alcohol-soaked sentimentality. Yet it remains a great novel. The...
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New Translation Presses Are Springing Up!
If you’re passionate about translations then small presses matter. New Directions, Open Letter, Other Press, Gray Wolf, Melville House, etc. – these publishers are introducing readers to the likes of...
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Interview with Jordan Stump, Translator
Jordan Stump is Antoine Volodine’s translator. He’s many other things – professor at the University of Nebraska, Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, the author of numerous articles… today...
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The Sultan of Byzantium by Selçuk Altun (translated from Turkish by Clifford...
If you’re a fan of The DaVinci Code, The Historian and other novels that combine the conspiracy theory, mystery and thriller genres – then there’s a spot for The Sultan of Byzantium on your bookshelf....
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The Healer: A Novel by Antti Tuomainen, translated from the original Finnish...
What makes the dystopian future described by Finnish author Antti Tuomainen so so disturbing is that it so closely resembles parts of the world we live in today. He’s made the canny decision to...
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The Dream of the Celt: A Novel by Mario Vargas Llosa, translated from the...
I prefer historical fiction to biography. An individual seldom lives up to the mythology arises around celebrity. I didn’t enjoy reading about F. Scott Fitzgerald’s descent into alcoholism, Edna St....
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All My Friends by Marie NDiaye, translated from the French by Jordan Stump
All My Friends is a book of short stories by French author Marie NDiaye. The second book released by Two Lines Press – a new publisher associated with The Center for the Art of Translation in...
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Eléctrico W by Hervé le Tellier, translated from the original French by...
Let’s talk about Oulipo. It’s a French movement that includes authors and mathematicians who use constraints when creating literature. For example: writing an entire novel without using the letter...
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The Corpse Reader by Antonio Garrido (translated from the Spanish by Thomas...
The Corpse Reader (another historical whodunnit in the same vein as The Hangman’s Daughter series) is published through Amazon Crossing, Amazon’s international/translation imprint. I bought it because...
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All Dogs Are Blue by Rodrigo de Souza Leão, translated from the Portuguese by...
All Dogs Are Blue is a beautifully nuanced portrayal of mental illness. Rodrigo de Souza Leão has given us a story set in a Brazilian mental institution which isn’t a caricature of lunacy. The author...
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Alphabet of the Night by Jean-Euphèle Milcé (translated from the original...
There’s a passage in Alain Mabanckou’s Black Bazaar where he compares expatriate Haitian writers to “hunted birds”. I wondered why Haitians are either brilliant writers or taxi drivers for life in New...
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The Map and the Territory by Michel Houellebacq, translated from the original...
This is the cover from the British edition, published by William Heinemann. I bought the book after hearing about the cover. It’s not wrapped in real bubble-wrap (like I believed) but the image of the...
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The Suicide Shop by Jean Teulé, translated from the original French by Sue Dyson
Gallic Books is a small UK press that publishes French books translated into English. They were founded in 2007 by two Random House alumni. Later in September I’ll be reviewing The President’s Hat...
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Reading Assignments for the 2013 Brooklyn Book Festival
Fall is here… more or less. The weather is still closer to 80 than 70 degrees. And the view from my window looks nothing like the cover of the L.L. Bean catalog that just arrived in the mail (a...
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The Days of the Rainbow by Antonio Skármeta & the film NO
The art on the cover had me expecting to read about a more grass-roots, Banksy-esque graffiti driven campaign. This is not the case. Still, it’s a great cover. In 1988 Chilean President and General...
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