The PR person at Penguin kindly drew my attention to the introduction, which explains why the editor compiled and organised the stories in the way she did. Fascinating and interesting, but the stand-out aspect of this collection for me is the way it has been organised into categories, a brave choice I think:
Couples
Men behaving badly
Women behaving badly
Misfits
Soldiers
Surrealists
Survivors
I want to read the stories in the Survivors section, but I am waiting for when I feel robust enough. At least one of the authors spent time in a concentration camp and one, like Primo Levi, committed suicide after the war.
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So far I’ve read Red Lipstick by MAGDALENA TULLI, a writer I’d never heard of before. (To be fair, I haven’t heard of most of the writers in this volume.) I enjooyed that. Currently I am reading a story by ADOLF RUDNICKI. Here are a couple of beautifully rendered excerpts:
“The sun looked yellow and only had strength for about an hour at noon, then it went white, melted and cooled off; the evenings set in early, cool and deep. In the desert of the evening only the moon cried above the town.”
and…
“...a large table surrounded by six armchairs suitable for anything but sitting; they must have been designed by a madman and made by another.”
I’m very much enjoying reading the stories, and even though I haven’t finished the book yet I am happy to recommend it.