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Book Title

Ashes in My Mouth, Sand in My Shoes

Subtitle
Stories
Author 1
Per Petterson; Translated from the Norwegian by Don Bartlett
Body
Young Arvid Jansen lives on the outskirts of Oslo. It’s the early sixties; his father works in a shoe factory and his Danish mother works as a cleaner. Arvid has nightmares about crocodiles and still wets his bed at night, but slowly he begins to understand the world around him. Vivid images accompany each new event: a photo of his mother as a young woman makes him cry as he realizes how time passes, and the black car that comes to collect his father on the day Arvid’s grandfather dies reminds him of the passing of his bullfinch. And then, one morning, his teacher tells his class to pray because a nuclear war is looming. Per Petterson’s debut, in which he introduces Arvid Jansen to the world, is a delicate portrait of childhood in all its complexity, its wonders and confusions, that will delight fans of Out Stealing Horses and new readers alike.

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List Price
$14.00
ISBN
ISBN
978-1-55597-700-9
Format
Format
Paperback
Publication Date
Publication Date
Subject
Subject
Pages
Pages
128
Trim Size
Trim Size
4.75 x 6.5
Keynote
The heartwarming debut that brought Per Petterson, author of the highly acclaimed Out Stealing Horses, to prominence

About the Author

Per  Petterson
Credit: Baard Henriksen
Per Petterson is the author of eight novels, including Men in My Situation and Out Stealing Horses, which has been translated into more than fifty languages. Petterson has received the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize, the Nordic Council Literature Prize, and the Norwegian Critics Prize. He lives in Norway.
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Don Bartlett lives in Norfolk, England, and works as a freelance translator of Scandinavian literature. He has translated, or co-translated, Norwegian novels by Gaute Heivoll (Before I Burn), Karl Ove Knausgaard, Lars Saabye Christensen, Roy Jacobsen (Borders; Child Wonder), Jo Nesbø, and Per Petterson (Ashes in My Mouth, Sand in My Shoes; I Refuse; It’s Fine By Me).
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Praise

  • “Dreamy and evanescent, [the stories] recall the opening pages of James Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.”The Washington Post
  • “Petterson inhabits Arvid’s mind in simple and plausible prose.”—Chicago Tribune
  • “Petterson uses what’s unspoken to wrench the reader’s heart.”Kirkus Reviews
  • “[Petterson’s writing] packs a powerful punch. . . . A bittersweet read that can be fully savored in one sitting.”—Publishers Weekly
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