The Farm, by Héctor Abad, translated by Anne McLean, World Editions, RRP£12.99/ Archipelago, RRP$20
When his mother’s death brings him back to the family farm in Colombia, Antonio Angel must confront the country’s multi-layered history of violence. Long-suppressed memories resurface as Antonio and his sisters take stock of lives transformed and lost over decades of armed conflict and political corruption.
EEG, by Dasa Drndic, translated by Celia Hawkesworth, Maclehose, RRP£14.99
The final novel by the late Croatian author is a poignant testament to her relentlessly probing spirit. After a failed suicide attempt, Andreas Ban finds himself travelling across the globe, haunted by the ghosts of the displaced. “History remembers the names of criminals, while the names of victims are forgotten.”
Tell Them of Battles, Kings and Elephants, by Mathias Enard, translated by Charlotte Mandell, Fitzcarraldo, RRP£10.99/ New Directions, RRP$19.95
This spirited novella by the award-winning French author of Compass imagines that greatest of Renaissance artists, Michelangelo, escaping the patronage of Pope Julius II and accepting a commission from the Turkish sultan to build a bridge over the Golden Horn.
Now, Now, Louison, by Jean Frémon, translated by Cole Swensen, Les Fugitives, RRP£12
Poet and curator Frémon gives voice to one of the outstanding artists of the 20th century, Louise Bourgeois, in a written portrait that is as tender as it is catty and cantankerous. Strands of memory unfurl — from Bourgeois’ childhood in France to her self-imposed exile in the US — alongside her thoughts on beauty and the purpose of art.
The End: My Struggle (Book Six), by Karl Ove Knausgaard, translated by Martin Aitken and Don Bartlett, Harvill Secker, RRP£25/ Archipelago, RRP$33
The final instalment in the Norwegian sensation’s six-part auto-fictional marathon takes a metatextual turn as he reflects, in the same painstaking detail that made the earlier volumes so strangely gripping, on the disruption to his life caused by the success of his magnum opus. Further reflections on fatherhood, marriage, death, writing and shame are complemented by a long digression on the rise of Nazism.
China Dream, by Ma Jian, translated by Flora Drew, Chatto & Windus, RRP£12.99
“China Dream” is the phrase used by the country’s leadership to describe its sustainable development plans. In his latest novel, Chinese exile Ma Jian appropriates the slogan to tell the story of a provincial politician driven mad by memories of his own corruption. A savage satire of Chinese authoritarianism and censorship.
, by Haruki Murakami, translated by Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen, Harvill Secker, RRP£20/ Knopf, RRP$30
Japan’s lionised author specialises in fiction that blurs the boundary between reality and unreality. His latest — rich in allusions, from Mozart to Springsteen, Lewis Carroll to F Scott Fitzgerald — follows an unnamed portrait artist who, after separating from his wife, finds himself seeking redemption in the house of a reclusive painter.
The Oblique Place, by Caterina Pascual Söderbaum, translated by Frank Perry, MacLehose, RRP£14.99
In this posthumously published and prizewinning autobiographical novel, the Swedish author’s discovery of a photo album sets her off on a journey across Europe as she unearths her own family’s links to some of the darkest episodes in 20th-century history. An unsettling reflection on memory and our proximity to evil.
CoDex 1962, by Sjón, translated by Victoria Cribb, Sceptre, RRP£18.99
There are echoes of Bulgakov, Sterne, the Icelandic Sagas and even the Old Testament in this surreal fable by the poet, novelist and Björk collaborator. From second world war-era Germany to present-day Reykjavík, the genre-hopping trilogy focuses loosely on Joséf — a clay baby born in a hatbox, and an alter-ego for the author.
The Piranhas, by Roberto Saviano, translated by Antony Shugaar, Picador, RRP£14.99/ Farrar, Straus & Giroux, RRP$27
Saviano made his name with Gomorrah, his 2006 exposé of Neapolitan crime, and paid a heavy price: he has been under police protection ever since. It must have been a relief to turn his hand to fiction in this debut novel, which follows a group of teenage hoodlums around Naples as they shoot, steal, extort and hack their way to power.
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