Author:Peter Høeg
Love as violence, love as a curse, love as redemption, as suffering, as wisdom, as innocence, as delusion – each story takes place on the night of 19 March 1929 and a character tries to understand or express love from his or her perspective: as dancer, lawyer, astronomer, mathematician, artist, actor, doctor, mirror-maker. This book, inhabited by real and imagined characters at the mid point between the two world wars, was an early landmark in a career that includes the controversial novel Borderliners and perhaps the most attractive thriller of the decade, Miss Smilla’s Feeling for Snow.
Carver is the king of short fiction. His writing hits you in the pit of your stomach, and haunts you with its disenchantment. It's almost visceral.
—— Natasha Lunn , RedCarver has made himself the natural successor to his true mentor, Chekhov
—— Financial TimesHe is alert to the unique, inconspicuous incident, when a life or a marriage may change course decisively
—— Sunday TelegraphCarver's stories celebrate some lasting aspects of the human condition, however minimal, conjuring up a quality of fellow feeling which gives the stories a compelling, dry-eyed poignancy, a melancholy but intensely moving authenticity
—— William Boyd , Daily TelegraphThere is nobody else like him. In some ways his pared-down style is an extreme development of the Hemingway style, but Carver writes about women and the ways men relate to them far more convincingly than Hemingway ever did
—— Frank KermodeCarver is a master of the clear, sharp, resonant detail
—— Daily Telegraph