Stones in a landslide by Maria Barbel
I have chosen to do a list of five books for the woman in Translation month. I have long held this up as the best book I have read from Peirene press for me it captures a microcosm of a world through the eyes of a Conxa a young girl that until she was thirteen knew just the village she grew up in the Pyrenees to move to a bigger village. I would recommend Peirene books to everyone and they have published a number of great books by women in translation including Mussel feast and The blue room as two other to try. Here is my review of Stones in a landslide .
The white book by Han Kang
I loved this book when I read it as I was just getting over the greif of losing my mother and found this collection of Vignettes by Han Kang that wrote her own mother lost a child before she was born and she reflects on how grief is treated in Korea. The rice moon cake child she lost I was touched by that image. If you had read this I would point you in the way of Deborah smiths press she translated this book and started Tilted Axis publishing female writers from Asia.
The tongue’s blood does not run dry by Assia Djebar
I picked this as she was considered to be a Nobel worthy winner before she passed away a few years ago Assia Djebar was the first writer of Maghreb origin to sit on the French academy. This was a collection of stories and a long novella the later dealt with a woman that was dying and all had a female perspective on the modern Arab world. I will be reviewing soon three books from Nawal El Saadawi that Saqi books have recently reissued.
Trieste by Dasa Drndric
A powerful tale by another great writer and one I was lucky enough to have met Dasa has a number of books now available in English this was the first to be translated and had the harrowing list of every Italian Jew that died in the second world war. I would also point you towards to more books from that region Farewell cowboy and Hah both from the great Istros books.
The Passport by Herta Muller
I read this early on in my blogging Career as it blew my mind with her descriptive skills and imagery it follows Windisch as he attempts to get a passport as a German in a small enclave in Romania. Two other great German books from Women I have read in the last year are The giant Dwarfs and River
I will be publishing Five more next month from the many female’s writers I have read in the last ten years.
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