<TitleType>01</TitleType> <TitleText>The Half Brother</TitleText> <Subtitle>A Novel</Subtitle>

Arcade Publishing 20100907 eng

GCDS-9781559707596 03 01 Arcade Publishing 01 GCOI 55970100819420 02 1559707593 03 9781559707596 15 9781559707596 BC <TitleType>01</TitleType> <TitleText>The Half Brother</TitleText> <Subtitle>A Novel</Subtitle> <TitleType>03</TitleType> <TitleText>Der Halvbroren</TitleText> 1 A01 Lars Saabye Christensen Lars Christensen is the prize-winning author of ten novels as well as short stories and poetry. He lives in Norway. 2 B06 nor Kenneth Steven 01 eng 02 nor 01 The Half Brother is a truly gripping, epic novel, hugely ambitious in scope and utterly compelling, a wonderful mixture of surreal comedy and touching intimacy. In stunning detail and elegant prose it relates the lives of four generations of a far from ordinary family. It opens on May 8, 1945, when 20-year-old Vera, hoping to celebrate with her mother and grandmother the end of World War II, is brutally raped by an unknown assailant. From that crime is born a boy named Fred, a misfit who later becomes a boxer. Barnum, Vera's other son born several years later, and Fred form a bizarre but special relationship. "I should have been your father," Fred tells Barnum, "instead of the fool who says he is." Spanning 50 years, filled with a wonderful galaxy of finely etched characters, and structurally brilliant, The Half Brother has been both a literary sensation and a best-seller wherever it has been published. Featured on NPR's nationally broadcast The WorldPublished in 25 countries: Albania, Brazil, Britain, Bulgaria, Czech Rep., Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Russia, Serbia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, USA 02 "The Half Brother is like Paul Auster's The Book of Illusions meeting Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections." -Anna Paterson, Independent (London) 08 Epic yet startlingly contemporary . . . Christensen tenderly explores all sorts of human connection, examining the emotions aroused by absence and persistence, and the complex nature of family and forgiveness. Like Péter Nádas's Book of Memories and Péter Esterházy's Celestial Harmonies, this is a challenging, marvelously rich novel steeped in European history and charged by present-day anxieties. . . . one of the literary must-reads of the summer. Publishers Weekly, STARRED 08 Christensen's gentleness surely relates to that moral conviction that underlies his writing. The Independent 08 This epic Norwegian novel, a major European bestseller and prizewinner, is a complex mosaic ... a thrilling and stimulating black comedy that shows, unforgettably, how art-and understanding-are shaped out of pain and suffering. Translator Steven deserves almost as much praise as does the remarkable author of this enormous, challenging, life-affirming masterpiece. Kirkus Reviews, STARRED 08 The Half Brother brilliantly fuses the epic sweep of a classic novel with the witty self-awareness of the best contemporary fiction . . . an enchanting tour de force woven with intelligence and grace, evincing that rare combination of page-turning suspense and substance that characterizes-dare we say it?-a masterpiece. Barnes & Noble Editorial Review 08 Rife with cinematic detail . . . Christensen's is a sincere reticence, born of memory's cracks and creations, inspiring a rare and unfashionable affect: wonder. Village Voice Literary Supplement 08 An eloquent chronicle . . . poignant and exquisitely drawn . . . [Christensen] is a gripping storyteller and an acute observer of the complex, contradictory reasons of the heart and mind. In The Half Brother Christensen flirts with, but stops just shy of cynicism . . . Compassion remains the one redemptive and humanizing force in [his] novel. WBUR 08 A compelling discovery. Library Journal 08 An ambitious book. Christensen has conflated the novel of ideas, with a family saga, a coming-of-age novel and a 'portrait of the artist as a young man' . . . His inventiveness is astonishing. San Francisco Chronicle 08 This is a great, panoramic saga of a book. . . . Reminiscent of Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections-but more engaging and better crafted. . . . Bruising and sorrowful . . . Lovingly translated. Christianity Today 08 One of the biggest, most ambitiously conceived, and richly imagined novels you may ever read, Christensen's The Half Brother may become one of the most important books of this generation. . . . As complete a family saga as you will ever find. . . . immense . . . With page after page of well-drawn, memorable scenes, dozens of carefully presented characters whose entire lives and history you know completely, surprises buried within seemingly ordinary narratives, and the creation of a complete and unique universe, this is a novel which will richly reward the reader who is not intimidated by its size. Ultimately, it is a novel that, like moonlight, 'welds together reality and all our imaginings.' Mostlyfiction.com 08 A powerful personal saga, with many interwoven themes, well presented. Complete Review 08 This is a great river of a book. . . . I was irresistibly carried along with the flow. The Half Brother is magnificent: a roman fleuve within a single volume. . . . The language stays so coherent and reads so grippingly. . . . It is worth trying anything to further the cause of this unique novel. The Half Brother is like Paul Auster's The Book of Illusions meeting Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections. Anna Paterson Independent 08 It certainly has the weight and bulk of The Corrections. . . . big, ambitious, panoramic . . . It is part Bildungsroman-depicting the coming of age of a writer-part a Ulysses for Oslo, whose snowy parks and shadowy churches are vividly rendered. It moves effortlessly from surreal comedy to touching scenes of domestic intimacy. Like its narrator, who barely seems to grasp the basics of human reproduction, it has an engaging innocence. . . . A big, rewarding read. Daily Telegraph 08 A total knock-out of a novel from Norway. . . . The high-octane narrative sparkles like sunlit snow in Kenneth Steven's pacy, muscular translation. Boyd Tonkin Independent 08 A richly imaginative work touching on the mystery and incompleteness of identity . . . prodigiously rich . . . marvellously caught . . . galvanic . . . A phenomenally successful novel . . . The Half Brother-translated into compulsively readable prose by writer Kenneth Steven-is no mere interesting example of contemporary Scandinavian writing; it's a deeply felt, intricately worked and intellectually searching work of absolutely international importance. Guardian 08 Such clarity, energy, and imaginative force! There are echoes here of other European writers besides Proust-Joyce, Halldór Laxness, even Strindberg . . . exhilarating. New Statesman 08 Utterly unputdownable. Caroline Michel Bookseller 08 Powerful, dramatic, and magical. . . . a runaway bestseller. Daily Mail 08 An epic story . . . The author is a literary star. BBC Today 08 With a haunting narrative, a wonderful mix of tragedy and black comedy, and sparkling characterisation, this is a gripping coming-of-age tale that leads readers inexorably full-circle. Good Book Guide 08 Ambitious in scope and something of an epic, it is a striking mix of tragedy and exuberant comedy, of the dreamily fantastical and the soberly realist. Benedicte Page Bookseller 08 A study of memory and mental processes, The Half Brother is a gargantuan meditation on the pain of intellectual being. This immense yarn about a flyweight character is also a heavyweight novel of ideas, full of authorial sleights of hand, occupying a curious cusp between laughter and tears. Independent on Sunday 08 The Half Brother combines the meticulousness of a short story and the ambition of an epic and in doing so shows time passing in a new way. . . . favouring event over explication and imagination over analysis. Times Literary Supplement 08 I was immediately engrossed in the flowing and powerful narrative and enjoyed it immensely. . . . It is refreshingly different from much of current British and American contemporary literature. Heartbreakingly profound, rich in imagination and many-layered, this is a big novel that is worth the effort. New Zealand Book-Club 08 The Half-Brother is an absolutely compelling story: intricate and warm. It is also very funny. It is like watching great clowning where tragedy and comedy work together. The magic is in the nuance and timing. New Zealand Herald 08 A tour de force, with a multitude of magic moments. . . . A Divine Comedy. A tragic comedy-cum-family chronicle of great proportions, beautifully crafted, Hamsunesque in its approach. Dagbladet 08 A wonder of a novel . . . as a Bildungsroman and childhood narrative it's a gem. . . . It runs deep. Aftenposten 08 Extraordinary imaginativeness and comedic talent Spiegel 08 The Half Brother is an opulent, expansive, and finely branched family saga, full of comedy, nostalgia and truth-a great, tremendously multi-layered, and deep novel, which never loses its ease and playfulness. Amazon Germany Editorial Review 08 A sparkling masterpiece . . . Written in one energetic stream of power. . . . Like a camera that slides from image to image, zooming in, moving back and forth and on again . . . The Half Brother is a novel with a brilliant, amazing force. NRC-Handelsblad 08 Whoever reads The Half Brother will wonder: for heaven's sake, why didn't anybody tell me about this writer before? . . . The structure of the book is like a film scenario, with an extremely compelling, musical rhythm. HP/De Tijd 08 Stirring story-telling. His descriptions will never cease to surprise you, chapter after chapter . . . An ingenious and thrilling literary structure. Trouw 08 A great literary achievement. Göteborgs-posten 08 A literary masterpiece. It grips the reader deeply in the heart and the brain. Jyllandsposten 08 A magic suitcase . . . in great prose. Information 08 It will be a long time before you can read something else and not be drowned by the sound of Christensen. Morgenposten 08 Poised to take North America in true Viking fashion . . . Christensen uses his city [Oslo] as a force that informs the essential cores of his main characters just as Joyce did before him with Dublin and Hugo with Paris. . . . Christensen writes eloquently . . . A contemporary Norse saga that simultaneously upholds and upbraids thousands of years of Scandinavian literary history. . . . An incredible narrative with a highly volatile, yet consistently graceful momentum. Cambridge Book Review 08 A Big Theme literary epic . . . haunted and haunting . . . The Half Brother is one to savor, as much for its quotable lines and cinematic detail as for its narrative lacunae, which lend it the intangible weight of myth. Village Voice 08 Important . . . Christensen takes his time weaving together the stories that circle and connect to each other in lyrical and unexpected ways, creating a rich tapestry of love, and pain, and memory. 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