Book picks similar to
Coltan by Alberto Vázquez-Figueroa
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Nazi Literature in the Americas
Roberto Bolaño - 1996
When it was published by Seix Barral in 1996, critics in Spain were quick to recognize the arrival of an important new talent. The book presents itself as a biographical dictionary of American writers who flirted with or espoused extreme right-wing ideologies in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. It is a tour de force of black humor and imaginary erudition. Nazi Literature in the Americas is composed of short biographies, including descriptions of the writers’ works, plus an epilogue (“for Monsters”), which includes even briefer biographies of persons mentioned in passing. All of the writers are imaginary, although they are all carefully and credibly situated in real literary worlds. Ernesto Pérez Masón, for example, in the sample included here, is an imaginary member of the real Orígenes group in Cuba, and his farcical clashes with José Lezama Lima recall stories about the spats between Lezama Lima and Virgilio Piñera, as recounted in Guillermo Cabrera Infante’s Mea Cuba. The origins of the imaginary writers are diverse. Authors from twelve different countries are included. The countries with the most representatives are Argentina (8) and the USA (7).
The Paris Enigma
Pablo De Santis - 2007
The Twelve Detectives—a society of the twelve most famous, compelling, and dazzling detectives from around the world—have been asked to discuss the secrets of their trade as part of the fair's lineup of events. The Twelve travel to Paris to convene as a single body for the first time, but also, if some whispers are to be believed, to debate the very philosophy that underlies their pursuit of the world's most wanted criminals.But one detective is conspicuously absent: the legendary founding member of The Twelve, Renato Craig, will not attend. In his place he sends his novice assistant, Sigmundo Salvatrio—son of a shoemaker, a lifelong detective-arts devotee, and the only remaining student of Craig's famed Academy for Detectives in Buenos Aires. Salvatrio arrives in Paris, carrying a secret message meant only for Craig's best friend and cofounder of The Twelve, the brilliant, brooding, and fiercely competitive Viktor Arzaky.When a member of The Twelve is discovered dead at the foot of the gleaming Eiffel Tower, the first in what turns into a series of grisly murders, Arzaky and Salvatrio find themselves in a race against time around glorious fin de siècle Paris, encountering all manner of secret societies, solving philosophical puzzles, while also trying to save a dangerously beautiful woman.The pair soon realizes that the stakes involved are unimaginably high; they must not only catch the stalking murderer but also alter the fate of their precious brotherhood.Written in a strikingly original voice, and poignantly evoking a world about to lose its innocence forever, The Paris Enigma opens a window onto crime solving's early days, when wit, common sense, and intelligence were the only tools a detective could rely on.
The Secret in Their Eyes
Eduardo Sacheri - 2005
As he revisits the details of the investigation, he is reacquainted with his similarly long, unrequited love for Irene Hornos, then just an intern, now a respected judge. Absorbing and masterfully crafted, The Secret in Their Eyes is a meditation on the effects of the passage of time and unfulfilled desire.Eduardo Sacheri’s tale is imbued with the subdued terror that characterized the Dirty War of 1970s Argentina, and was made into the Academy Award winning film of the same name in 2009.
Q
Luther Blissett - 1999
Across the chessboard of Europe, from the German plains to the flourishing Dutch cities and down to Venice, the gateway to the East, our hero, a 'Survivor', a radical Protestant Anabaptist who goes under many names, and his enemy, a loyal papal spy and heretic hunter known mysteriously as "Q" play a game in which no moves are forbidden and the true size of the stakes remain hidden until the end. What begins as a personal struggle to reveal each other's identity becomes a mission that can only end in death.
The Last Cato
Matilde Asensi - 2001
Ottavia Salina is called upon by the highest levels of the Roman Catholic Church to decipher the scars found on an Ethiopian man's corpse: seven crosses and seven Greek letters.The markings, symbolizing the Seven Deadly Sins, are part of an elaborate initiation ritual for the Staurofilakes, the clandestine brotherhood hiding the True Cross for centuries, headed by a secretive figure called Cato.With the help of a member of the Swiss Guard and a renowned archaeologist, Dr. Salina uncovers the connection between the brotherhood and Dante's Divine Comedy, and races across the globe to Christianity's ancient capitals. Together, they will face challenges that will put their faith—and their very lives—to the ultimate test.
A Spy In Vienna: A Paul Muller Novel of Political Intrigue
William N. Walker - 2018
It is the second Paul Muller novel set in Europe before World War II. Muller is recruited to become a spy to resist Hitler's campaign to absorb Austria into the German Reich and, from his perch in Vienna, finds himself at the epicenter of the desperate struggle to preserve Austrian independence. Muller plays a dangerous game in helping Austria oppose Hitler's demands and he hatches a bold plan to divert Austria's gold reserves so they stay out of Hitler's grasp. The novel captures this gripping drama in rich and vivid detail as political pressures mount and the threat of war looms. A Spy in Vienna re-creates for readers the fraught atmosphere of 1930's, when the threat of Nazi violence hung over Europe. Aficionados of that epoch will relish the authenticity of the novel, which reawakens the tensions and turbulence of the era, with its undercurrent of violence and fear. The narrative recaptures the urgency of the crisis as repeated confrontations escalated to an explosive conclusion. Today, sitting at the safe remove of eighty years, we know the outcome. Hitler's bald aggression prevailed; his takeover of Austria became a crucial stepping stone leading to World War II. But the characters in the novel know none of this; for them, the events they are caught up in are frightening and bewildering, confronting them with dire choices and fearful consequences. The novel transports the reader into that contemporary maelstrom of intrigue and danger—combining real history with a compelling story. Admirers of Paul Muller in Danzig will revel in his new adventures in Vienna, as once again he confronts Nazi tyranny.
The Dogs of War
Frederick Forsyth - 1974
At certain times of the day the mountain emits a strange glow. Only Sir James Manson knows why. The mountain contains ten billion dollars worth of the world's most valuable mineral, platinum. Now the only question is, how to get hold of it. Sir James knows how. Invade the country with a band of savage, cold-blooded mercenaries. Topple the government and set up a puppet dictatorship. Unleash the dogs of war.
Ordesa
Manuel Vilas - 2018
In the face of enormous personal tumult, he sits down to write. What follows is an audacious chronicle of his childhood and an unsparing account of his life's trials, failures, and triumphs that becomes a moving look at what family gives and takes away.With the intimacy of a diarist, he reckons with the ghosts of his parents and the current specters of his divorce, his children, his career, and his addictions. In unswervingly honest prose, Vilas explores his identity after great loss--what is a person without a marriage or without parents? What is a person when faced with memories alone? Already an acclaimed poet and novelist in Spain, Vilas takes his work to a whole new level with this autobiographical novel; critics have called it "a work of art able to cauterize pain."Elegiac and searching, Ordesa is a meditation on loss and a powerful exploration of a person who is both extraordinary and utterly ordinary--at once singular and representing us all--who transforms a time of crisis into something beautiful and redemptive.
Seeing Calvin Coolidge in a Dream
John Derbyshire - 1996
He and his wife, Ding, are the parents of an infant and enjoy a contented marriage; he develops a fond obsession with President Calvin Coolidge, the taciturn New Englander whose wry wit and wisdom delights Chai. One day, a chance discovery leads him astray: He learns that a lover from his youth is now in Boston, living with her husband and their son. The son is Chai's very image, and the staid banker is inflamed by the implications of the resemblance. Confused by his emotions, he becomes determined to revive the affair. How Ding schemes to win back her wayward husband--and teach him the necessary truths about love--forms the plot and beguiling conclusion to John Derbyshire's tale.
All This I Will Give to You
Dolores Redondo - 2016
It won’t be the last. He’s now arrived in Galicia. It’s where Álvaro died. It’s where the case has already been quickly closed as a tragic accident. It’s also where Álvaro hid his secrets.The man to whom Manuel was married for fifteen years was not the unassuming man he knew.Álvaro’s trail leads Manuel deep into one of Spain’s most powerful and guarded families. Behind the walls of their forbidding estate, Manuel is nothing but an unwelcome and dangerous intruder. Then he finds two allies: a stubbornly suspicious police lieutenant and Álvaro’s old friend—and private confessor—from seminary school. Together they’re collecting the pieces of Álvaro’s past, his double life, and his mysterious death.But in the shadows of nobility and privilege, Manuel is about to unravel a web of corruption and deception that could be as fatal a trap for him as it was for the man he loved.
Palm Trees in the Snow
Luz Gabás - 2012
Her father and his brother worked in the colony of Fernando Po, but these letters tell a different story than the tales of life in Africa that made it to the dinner table. Clarence has no idea what really went on during their time at the cocoa plantations—or why no one in her family has ever returned to the island in all the years since. But the letters suggest that a great love story is buried beneath the years of silence.Setting out from her home in Spain’s snowy mountains, Clarence makes the same journey across the sea that her uncle and father traveled before her. There, she unlocks the painful secrets her family has hidden in the rich African soil. But what she discovers may also be the key to awakening her own listless heart.
The City of Joy
Dominique Lapierre - 1985
Made into a movie starring Patrick Swayze, this is the inspiring story of an American doctor who experienced a spiritual rebirth in an impoverished section of Calcutta.
The Colour of Milk
Nell Leyshon - 2012
But as she does so through four seasons of one extraordinary year, she discovers that nothing comes for free. Told by a narrator whose urgent, unforgettable voice will break your heart, The Colour of Milk is an astonishing novel.
The Friends of Harry Perkins
Chris Mullin - 2019
At the UN there was talk of relieving the UK of its seat on the Security Council.' Thirty-five years after the publication of A Very British Coup, former Labour MP Chris Mullin has written a compelling and timely sequel. In a near-future, post-Brexit Britain, the fault lines forged in the white heat of the referendum have become entrenched features of British political life. Britain's standing in the world has steadily diminished as its problems have grown. Into the maelstrom steps Fred Thompson, former aide to left-wing prime minister Harry Perkins and his successor as MP for Sheffield Parkside. As he ascends the greasy pole of British politics, Thompson must deal with corruption, the threat of the Far Right and personal tragedy. Along the way, he learns that power does not come without a personal price and that shadowy forces are at work behind the scenes...which, this time, appear to be on his side. At once a gripping political thriller and a chilling prognostication of where we may be headed, this taut, insightful and engrossing novel is essential reading for our troubled times.