Read Around Europe Challenge
Read at least one book by an author from each country in Europe.
Best books from Europe (4415)
1011.
Vladivostok Circus by Elisa Shua Dusapin EN
FranceDescription:
Nathalie arrives at the circus in Vladivostok, Russia, fresh out of fashion school in Geneva. She is there to design the costumes for a trio of artists who are due to perform one of the most dangerous acts of all- the Russian Bar. As winter approaches, the season at Vladivostok is winding down, leaving the windy port city empty as the performers rush off to catch trains, boats, and buses home; all except the Russian bar trio and their manager. They are scheduled to perform at a festival in Ulan Ude, just before Christmas. What ensues is an intimate and beguiling account of four people learning... continue
1012.
The Postcard by Anne Berest EN
Description:
A BEST BOOK OF 2023 TIME Magazine・NPR・Library Journal・Lilith Magazine "A testament to the power of imagination and an investigation of empathy."--Vogue "Stunning."--Leslie Camhi, The New Yorker "A can't-miss novel."--Chicago Review of Books "Compelling."--The Washington Examiner Anne Berest's The Postcard is among the most acclaimed and beloved French novels of recent years. It is at once a gripping investigation into family trauma, a poignant tale of mothers and daughters, and a vivid portrait of twentieth-century Parisian intellectual and artistic life. January, 2003. Together with the usual... continue
1013.
Description:
Edouard Levé delivered the manuscript for his final book, Suicide, just a few days before he took his own life. Suicide cannot be read as simply another novel—it is, in a sense, the author’s own oblique, public suicide note, a unique meditation on this most extreme of refusals. Presenting itself as an investigation into the suicide of a close friend—perhaps real, perhaps fictional—more than twenty years earlier, Levé gives us, little by little, a striking portrait of a man, with all his talents and flaws, who chose to reject his life, and all the people who loved him, in favor of oblivion. Gra... continue
1014.
La Bête Humaine by Emile Zola FR
Description:
Did possessing and killing amount to the same thing deep within the dark recesses of the human beast? La Bete humaine (1890), is one of Zola's most violent and explicit works. On one level a tale of murder, passion and possession, it is also a compassionate study of individuals derailed by atavistic forces beyond their control. Zola considered this his `most finely worked' novel, and in it he powerfully evokes life at the end of the Second Empire in France, where society seemed to be hurtling into the future like the new locomotives and railways it was building. While expressing the hope that ... continue
1015.
Forvandlingens metode by Édouard Louis DK
Description:
"The story of my life is a long series of broken friendships. At every stage of my life, of this race with myself, I have had to leave people I have loved in order to go even further. It was not a conscious decision on my part, nor on theirs: I was fighting to transform myself, and they did not have the same obsession..." French author Édouard Louis' autofictional novel The Method of Transformation is a story about moving from the absolute bottom of society to the top. About escaping one's background through success and becoming part of Paris's economic and soci... continue
1016.
1017.
Tartuffe : Comedy in Five Acts, 1669 by Molière EN
Description:
An imposter cleric gets into the house of the wealthy Orgon, whom he fools into promising him his wealth, position, and his young daughter. The translation into English verse of one of Molière's most masterful and most popular plays. A continuous delight from beginning to end (Richard Eberhart). Introduction by Richard Wilbur.
1018.
The Miser : A Comedy by Molière EN
Description:
This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute thi... continue
1019.
Sleeping Children : A Novel by Anthony Passeron EN
Description:
An intimate, captivating first novel that tells the story of a family in southern France whose lives are intertwined with the history of the AIDS crisis—and with the forgotten French doctors who are among the first to detect the virus. Writing is the only way for my uncle’s story, my family’s story, not to disappear with them, with the town. To show them that Désiré’s life was part and parcel of all the world’s welter, a welter of historical, geographical, and social particulars. And help them to let go of their pain, to escape the loneliness into which that grief and shame had plunged them. F... continue
