Author:Alphonse Daudet,Frederick Davies
Alphonse Daudet's novels established him as the most successful writer in France by the end of the XIX century; but it was the LETTERS, first published in book form in 1869, which remained his favourite creation and has proved his most lasting.
Throughout his working life in Paris Daudet never lost his almost umbilical attachment to Provence. These tales of that region are characterised by a tenderness and delicacy, a wistfulness and wry humour, which give moving substance to his claim that to invent, for him, was to remember.
Richard Yates is a writer of commanding gifts: an astonishing skill and robust intelligence. His prose is urbane yet sensitive, with passion and irony held deftly in balance.
—— Saturday ReviewRichard Yates stands today as America's finest realistic novelist
—— The Boston GlobeYates is a realist par excellence. Read and weep
—— Kate AtkinsonThe most perceptive author of the twentieth century...A magnificent writer
—— The TimesOne of the greatest American novelists of the twentieth century
—— Sunday TelegraphEvery good writer I know acknowledges Yates as a master
—— Kurt VonnegutKeret's surreal conceits are couched in a wry, downbeat language...The effect is something like a sorrowful hybrid of Kafka and Donald Barthelme: deadpan on the surface, with a bassnote of discomfort and emotional alienation that makes even the briefest tales snag in the mind...Each piece is at once universal and particular...world-class gems. The translation is brilliant, too
—— Tim Martin , Daily TelegraphEtgar Keret is the voice of young Israel
—— IndependentOne of the greatest short story writers alive
—— Ben RiceOne of the most important writers alive... enchantingly witty
—— Clive JamesEtgar Keret's extraordinary imagination sets the reader free from slogans and headlines
—— Linda Grant