Boris Vian was a jack of all trades, although unfortunately his name was Boris and "Boris of all trades" never took off as a turn of phrase. Nevertheless, Vian was a great songwriter, playwright, singer, jazz critic, and, of course, novelist. Vian's 1947 novel Autumn in Peking (L'Automne à Pékin) is perhaps Vian's most slapstick work, with an added amount of despair in its exotic recipe for a violent cocktail drink.

The story takes place in the imaginary desert called Exopotamie where all the leading characters take part in the building of a train station with tracks that go nowhere. Houses and buildings are destroyed to build this unnecessary structure - and in Vian's world, waste not, make not.

In Alistair Rolls' pioneering study of Vian's novels, "The Flight of the Angels," he expresses that Exopotamie is a thinly disguised version of Paris, where after the war, the city started changing its previous centuries of architecture to something more modern. Yes, something dull to take the place of what was exciting and mysterious.

Vian, in a mixture of great humor and an unequal amount of disgust, introduces various 'eccentric' characters in this 'desert' adventure, such as Anne and Angel who are best friends; and Rochelle who is in love and sleeps with Anne, while Angel is madly in love with her. Besides the trio, there is also Doctor Mangemanche; the archeologist Athanagore Porphyroginite, his aide, Cuivre; and Pipo - all of them in a locality similar to Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland, where there is a tinge of darkness and anything is possible, except for happiness.

De Avonden vertelt het verhaal van Frits van Egters, die in de donkere decemberdagen van vlak na de Tweede Wereldoorlog zich een houding probeert te geven tegenover zijn ouders en vrienden. Over alles ligt een grijze waas van melancholie, en met zijn eigenzinnige gevoel voor humor probeert hij door het pantser van de verveling te breken.

In het ontroerende slothoofdstuk komt hij tot het louterende inzicht dat hij door te kijken en te observeren de zinloosheid heeft bezworen: 'Het is gezien, het is niet onopgemerkt gebleven.'

Carmen Laforet’s "Nada" ranks among the most important literary works of post-Civil War Spain. Loosely based on the author’s own life, it is the story of an orphaned young woman named Andrea who leaves her small town to attend university in war-ravaged Barcelona.

Residing amid genteel poverty in a mysterious house on Calle de Aribau, young Andrea falls in with a wealthy band of schoolmates who provide a rich counterpoint to the squalor of her home life. As experience overtakes innocence, Andrea gradually learns the disquieting truth about the people she shares her life with: her overbearing and superstitious aunt Angustias; her nihilistic yet artistically gifted uncle Román and his violent brother Juan; and Juan’s disturbingly beautiful wife, Gloria, who secretly supports the clan with her gambling.

From existential crisis to a growing maturity and resolve, Andrea’s passionate inner journey leaves her wiser, stronger, and filled with hope for the future.

The incomparable Edith Grossman’s vital new translation captures the feverish energy of Laforet’s magnificent story, showcasing its dark, powerful imagery, and its subtle humor.

Michael Moran is an old Irish Republican whose life was forever transformed by his days of glory as a guerilla leader in the Irish War of Independence. Now, in old age, living out in the countryside, Moran is still fighting—with his family, his friends, and even himself—in a poignant struggle to come to terms with the past.

This novel is a haunting testimony to the enduring qualities of the human spirit and a deep exploration of the complexities of a man who cannot let go of his past glories and the impact this has on his relationships and personal peace.

The General of the Dead Army is a moving and timely meditation on war and its consequences. Twenty years after World War II, an Italian general—armed with maps, measurements, and dental records—is sent to Albania to recover the remains of his country’s fallen soldiers. A quarrelsome priest joins him, and in rain and sleet, they dig up the Albanian countryside—once a battlefield, now a graveyard—checking teeth and dog tags, assembling a dead army in pine-box uniforms.

In addition to the brutal weather, they also battle the hostility of the Albanians working for them. This may be an errand of mercy for the general, but the chance to humiliate their one-time conquerors offers the Albanians a welcome vengeance. Fighting the hopelessness of his undertaking, the general finds his movements shadowed by a German general on the same gruesome mission for his own country.

In a terrible crescendo at a wedding, the Italian general must answer for the crimes of his country and all countries that have invaded this land of eagles, seeking to destroy its people. Enthralling and poignant, The General of the Dead Army is an elegy for the young people of every country who are sent abroad to die in battle.