White Nights - by Urszula Honek (Paperback)

About the Book

"In a village in the remote countryside of southern Poland, it's as if the poverty and brutality emanate like mist from the cursed dirt. The thirteen connected stories in White Nights tell of families, scarred by tragedy but also by each other. Whether by digging a pond deep in the woods, taking a lover, raising a family, or simply trying to get ahead of the endless work as the thunder rolls over their home, Urszula Honek's characters share, with the sincerest care and honesty, a local-yet so clearly universal-story of ruin and hope. A story in which they do not ask to be understood, but merely to be heard"-- Provided by publisher.

Book Synopsis

LONGLISTED FOR THE BOOKER INTERNATIONAL PRIZE

In a village in the remote countryside of southern Poland, it's as if the poverty and brutality emanate like mist from the cursed dirt. The thirteen interconnected stories in White Nights tell of families, scarred by tragedy but also by each other. Whether by digging a pond deep in the woods, taking a lover, raising a family, or simply trying to get ahead of the endless work as the thunder rolls over their home, Urszula Honek's characters share, with the sincerest care and honesty, a local--yet so clearly universal--story of ruin and hope. Kate Webster's blazing translation of Urszula's poetic and earthen prose brings us to places seldom seen in literature, where the people do not ask to be understood, but merely to be heard.

Review Quotes

Longlisted for the International Booker Prize

Winner of the Witold Gombrowicz Literary Prize

Winner of the Kościelski Award

Shortlisted for the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation

"White Nights is a dark, lyrical exploration of the ways in which people seek meaning and belonging in a transient world."--International Booker Prize judging committee

"Honek with complete cruelty, but also mastery, symbolically kills her influences. She stands firmly on her own two feet, moving readers with her own voice - immediately clear, set and full."--Paulina Malochleb, Empik Critics' Choice

"White Nights, is akin to reading an account of a haunted place - one that is beautiful and devastating in equal measure. . . . Though firmly categorizable as literary fiction, my eerie detector prickled at the dreamlike, latent danger threading through these interconnected chronicles."--Jennifer Brough, Litro Magazine