Friday 21 January 2022

2 BY LEO PERUTZ

A couple of novels from way, way back from an author I had never heard of until Pushkin Vertigo re-issued some of his work..... Leo Perutz


I don't read enough older, historical, GA type fiction. And I don't read enough European fiction. Two ticks in the box for one here. 


From Pushkin's website....

Leo Perutz is the author of eleven novels that attracted the admiration of such writers as Graham Greene, Ian Fleming, Italo Calvino, and Jorge Luis Borges. He was born in Prague in 1882 and lived in Vienna until the Nazi Anschluss, when he fled to Palestine. He returned to Austria in the fifties and died in 1957.


Little Apple (1928)


Vittorin, a young Austrian officer released from a Russian prisoner-of-war camp returns home to Vienna where his family, his girlfriend and his old job await him. But he cannot even think of settling into a new life until he has tracked down the camp commandant who bullied his prisoners.








Saint Peter's Snow (1933)

It could have been a common street accident that put Dr. Georg Amberg in the hospital, but for the five weeks his doctors say he has been in a coma, recovering from a brain hemorrhage after being run down by a car, he has memories of a more disturbing nature. What of the violent events in the rural village of Morwede? The old woman threatening the priest with a breadknife, angry peasants with flails and cudgels, Baron von Malchin with a pistol defending his dreams for the Holy Roman Empire - how could Dr. Amberg ignore these? And what of the secret experiment to make a mind-altering drug from a white mildew occurring on wheat - a mildew called Saint 
Peter's Snow.

In this feverish tale of a man caught in the balance between two realities, Leo Pertuz offers a mystery of identity and a fable of faith and political fervor, banned by the Nazis when it was first published in 1933. Saint Peter's Snow is typical of Perutz's storytelling mastery: extraordinarily rich and elegant fiction that is taut with suspense, full of Old World irony and humor.





6 comments:

  1. These really look interesting to me, Col. The era gets my attention - lots going on at that time, and lots of good fodder for a novel. And the plots sound appealing, too. I ought to look this work up.

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    1. Definitely a lot going on in Europe at that time and events had an impact on him personally, so must have surely influenced his writing. I hope you like them if your cross paths at any point.

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  2. These books sound very good and I had never heard of this author. I will look around for these. (And put them on a list. I am still successfully limiting my buying in 2022.)

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    1. I hope you can cross paths with them Tracy at some point. Well done on your restraint (so far)!

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  3. Never heard of him, either, Col. But these are well worth a look. Thanks for the heads up.

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    1. Elgin, you're welcome. I hope you like his work if you give him a spin.

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