Lesung - "Juli, August, September" von Olga Grjasnowa

In the organizer's words:

Reading and discussion with Olga Grjasnowa

Olga Grjasnowa reads from her new novel "July, August, September" (Hanser Berlin, 2024)

Moderation: Sophia Bahl

As always, we open our bar!

The novel: Lou's second husband is a trophy - even her mother has to acknowledge that. Sergei is a pianist and he is Jewish, just like Lou. Despite this, her daughter Rosa has never been to a synagogue - a normal Jewish family in Berlin. But are they still a family, and what is that anyway? To find out, Lou accepts an invitation to her aunt's 90th birthday party. In a run-down resort on Gran Canaria, the whole ex-Soviet clan from Israel comes together, linked only by mutual resentment. Lou systematically drinks against the petty malice and the vague emptiness within herself and suddenly knows that the answer to all her questions can be found in the sweltering heat of Tel Aviv.

A novel as topical, cynical and entertaining as only Olga Grjasnowa can write, about a woman whose identity is made up of fragments that don't seem to fit together. Until, in an unexpected way, they do.

Olga Grjasnowa was born in Baku, Azerbaijan. She has spent long periods abroad in Poland, Russia, Turkey, the USA and Israel. She has published one essay and four novels to date, most recently "The Prodigal Son" in 2020. Her works have been translated into 15 languages, adapted for radio and stage and made into films. She lives as a professor at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna.