fall 20 21 winter 2022 @restlessbooks restlessbooks.org bit.ly/RestlessNewsletter Contents MISSION SUPPORT US Restless Books is an independent, nonprofit publisher As a nonprofit organization, Restless Books relies on devoted to championing essential voices from the generosity of our readers and partners to achieve around the world whose stories speak to us across our mission. Your support enables us to discover linguistic and cultural borders. We seek extraordinary and promote extraordinary authors from around international literature for adults and young the world, to champion perspectives from outside readers that feeds our restlessness: our hunger for the confines of the familiar, and to take risks in our Letter from the Publisher 4 new perspectives, passion for other cultures and editorial choices, always emphasizing literary value languages, and eagerness to explore beyond the over the concerns of the market. confines of the familiar. Adult Trade Through cultural programming, we aim to Please contribute at celebrate immigrant writing and bring literature to restlessbooks.org/donate Death Fugue 5 underserved communities. We believe that immigrant The Memory Monster 6 stories are a vital component of our cultural consciousness; they help to ensure awareness of our Life Sciences 7 communities, build empathy for our neighbors, and Restless Books gratefully acknowledges the strengthen our democracy. support of the following organizations for our Mud Sweeter than Honey 10 2021 titles: BOARD OF DIRECTORS The Murders of Moisés Ville 13 Amazon Literary Partnership, FACE Foundation, Annette Hochstein, Chair FILI: Finnish Literature Exchange, Italian Ministry of Alison Gore, Secretary Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Japan Yonder Alison Sparks, Treasurer Foundation, Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture Devin Brooks and Sport Rat Rule 79 14 Neal Cohen It's OK, Slow Lizard 16 Jodie Corngold Shaul Hochstein Steven G. Kellman Recently Published 18 Ilan Stavans Forthcoming 19
ADVISORY BOARD Yonder Highlights 20 Stephanie Anderson, Assistant Director of Selection Restless Classics Highlights 21 for BookOps (NYPL & BPL) Jeff Deutsch, Director of Seminary Co-op Bookstore Rights Highlights 22 Cristina García, Author Galit Hasan-Rokem, Author Programs 24 David Bruce Smith, Author † Norton Juster, Architect, Author, and Professor Cover illustration © Jian Kim, from It's OK, Slow Lizard Ordering Information 25 Mitchell Kaplan, Owner of Books & Books and Author photo credits: Co-Founder of The Miami Book Fair Sheng Keyi (page 3) © Mark King Mario Vargas Llosa, Author Margo Rejmer (page 10) © Katarzyna Lasoń Javier Sinay (page 13) © Veronica Martinez Ruth Ozeki, Author Rivka Galchen (page 14) © Sandy Tait David L. Ulin, Author
† We mourn the loss of Norton Juster, who passed away in March 2021. AUGUST Letter from the Publisher Death Fugue Sheng Keyi As the pandemic recedes and surges in turns around the world, it’s time to commit ourselves Translated from the Chinese by Shelly Bryant to seeing through a global lens. Restless Books is ready. After all, our core mission is to use the highest-quality literature to bridge cultures and attune ourselves to voices outside of the Banned in China for its taboo allusions to the American mainstream. Our upcoming lineup is exemplary: an assortment of breathtaking books Tiananmen Square massacre, Death Fugue from four continents. is a lyrical and explosive dystopian satire of Sheng Keyi’s no-holds-barred novel Death Fugue, which was banned in China, is an incisive manufactured existence, the erasure of personal meditation on the authoritarian future with echoes of Franz Kafka and George Orwell. Joy freedom, and the perils of governmental control. Sorman’s Life Sciences, from France, is an inventive coming-of-age novel about a young woman's “A stomach-churning, exuberantly written allegory . . . recalls quest for self-determination despite a centuries-old matrilineal family curse. Margo Rejmer’s Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World.” —The New York Times magnificent Mud Sweeter than Honey, an example of journalism of the highest caliber, reflects on the legacy of Enver Hoxha, Albania’s Communist tyrant, by arranging a chorus of survivors’ “Anyone remotely interested in an insider’s untrammeled, voices, in the tradition of Studs Terkel and Svetlana Alexeievich. Also a masterful investigative Paperback List Price: US $19.00 authoritative vision of what’s going on in China will jump into this mosaic, Javier Sinay’s autobiographical The Murders of Moisés Ville looks at the tension that ISBN: 9781632062925 fascinating cauldron of a novel, at risk of being boiled alive.” Publication: Aug 3, 2021 underscored Jewish immigration to Argentina at the end of the nineteenth century through the —Sydney Review of Books 5.5" x 8.25" • 384 pages prism of the author’s quest to understand his own Jewish heritage. And from South Korea, the Fiction: China / Politics / Revolution / enchanting picture book It’s OK, Slow Lizard by Yeorim Yoon and Jian Kim is a wise invitation Dystopian / Speculative Fiction “[F]ull of clever observations, energy, wit, imaginativeness, and Rights Held: World English excl. ANZ, to decelerate in order to appreciate life in full. We are also pleased to include two paperback endless lush, colorful landscapes that toe the line between the China, Southeast Asia reissues: Yishai Sarid’s much-discussed post-Holocaust meditation from Israel, The Memory beautiful and the fantastical.” —Words Without Borders eBook ISBN: 9781632062932 Monster; and Rivka Glachen’s razor-sharp middle-grade novel Rat Rule 79, both favorites among • An internationally acclaimed large audiences. One morning, a nine-story tower of excrement inexplicably appears author: Sheng Keyi received The work of a nonprofit publishing house like ours is built on trust. Readers trust us to in the capital of Dayang. The government performs a hasty cover-up, the Chinese People’s Literature canvas the contemporary literary scene to find gems worth rendering into superb English sparking protests that quickly explode in unrest. Mengliu, a young poet, Prize, the Yu Dafu Prize for and his girlfriend Qizi are swept up in the movement—but in the brutal translations. In that sense, our task is to curate as sharp and comprehensive a selection as Fiction, and the Chinese crackdown that follows, Qizi, along with thousands of other protestors, Literature Media Award. possible. We call on a vast number of friends—authors, translators, editors, and agents—around disappears. • A voice that can’t be silenced: the globe to send us eye-opening material. Our responsibility is to be discerning in our diverse Years later, while searching for Qizi, Mengliu washes ashore in Death Fugue is still unpublished tastes. To succeed, we, in turn, depend on the trust of readers. The joy and enlightenment the utopian Swan Valley. Initially seduced by the opulence and order in China because of its the books provide is our reward. We also offer acclaimed literary programs to underserved of Swan Valley, Mengliu soon uncovers the deep, inhumane cost of allegorical depiction of the 1989 communities: reading the classics in prisons, for instance; participating in writing workshops maintaining this perfect society. Lavish, relentless, and occasionally Tiananmen Square massacre and its confrontation with geared toward emerging immigrant writers; and discussing classic world literature via Zoom on unhinged, Death Fugue is a profound dystopian meditation on art and suppression in China. a monthly basis in partnerships with the New York Public Library and other institutions. freedom. • A timely examination of Fulfilling our expanding mission requires all sorts of resources, most crucially from you. protest: Death Fugue grapples Readers who buy our books, spread the word about them, and make small donations enable us SHENG KEYI is the author of ten novels as well with the necessity of protest in as numerous short stories and novellas. Her debut to be the avid grassroots organization that we are. Please spread the goodwill for Restless Books effecting social, political, and novel in English translation, Northern Girls, was cultural change. by encouraging more readers to open our books, or by sending a contribution of whatever longlisted for the Man Asian Literary Prize in size you’re comfortable with. Rest assured that it will go into fresh, startling new literary 2012. She has received numerous literary awards, explorations that will change audiences everywhere. Gracias! including the Chinese People’s Literature Prize, the Yu Dafu Prize for Fiction, and the Chinese —Ilan Stavans Literature Media Award. She lives in New York.
fall 2021 winter 2022 | restless books 5 SEPTEMBER OCTOBER The Memory Monster Life Sciences Yishai Sarid Joy Sorman Translated from the Hebrew by Yardenne Greenspan Translated from the French by Lara Vergnaud Introduction by Catherine Lacey A New York Times Book Review 100 Notable Books of 2020 Selection—now in paperback “Women are heiresses, inheritors of a thousand demented and limiting ideas of what a woman “[A] slim but powerful novel, rendered beautifully in English by can or should be. Most women know this; many translator Greenspan. . . . A bold, masterful exploration of the resist.” —Catherine Lacey, from the Introduction banality of evil and the nature of revenge, controversial no matter how it is read.” —Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review “The strong and tender prose combined with the stubborn dedication of a teenager battling a matrilineal curse transforms “A brilliant, challenging, and uncompromising novel” Sorman’s novel into a brave and superb saga of pain, wherein Paperback List Price: US $16.00 —Jewish Currents darkness turns to light, to life.” —Diacritik Paperback List Price: US $18.00 ISBN: 9781632060600 ISBN: 9781632062956 Publication: Sep 7, 2021 Publication: Oct 12, 2021 5" x 7.125" • 192 pages “A brilliant short novel that serves as a brave, sharp-toothed brief “Life Sciences is a text containing countless possible 5" x 7.125" • 272 pages Fiction: Israeli / Holocaust / Jewish / against letting the past devour the present” (The New York Times interpretations—almost everything is already there, unfolded, Fiction: Chronic Illness / Women / Literary Fiction Book Review), The Memory Monster is a harrowing parable of a young Relationships / Medicine aligned to the surface.” —Le Monde Rights Held: World English, Audio historian who becomes consumed by the memory of the Holocaust. Rights Held: World English, Audio eBook ISBN: 9781632062727 Written as a report to the chairman of Yad Vashem, Israel’s memorial eBook ISBN: 9781632062963 Ninon Moise is cursed. So is her mother, Esther, and so was the eldest to the victims of the Holocaust, our unnamed narrator recounts his • A New York Times Book female member of every generation in her lineage going back to the • The English debut of a bold, own undoing. Hired as a promising young historian, he soon becomes Review 100 Notable Books of Middle Ages. Each matriarch has been marked by a uniquely obscure subversive talent: Joy Sorman a leading expert on Nazi methods of extermination at concentration 2020 Selection disease or ailment, all without apparent explanation, origin, or cure. is a prolific, celebrated author camps in Poland during World War II and guides tours through the sites known for pushing genres and • A timely, unflinching portrait Ninon grows up comforted and fascinated by her mother’s recitation for students and visiting dignitaries. He hungrily devours every detail of boundaries. of human atrocity: At a time of these bizarre medical mysteries, forewarned that something will life and death in the camps and takes pride in being able to recreate for of resurgent global conflict, happen to her. Her own entry into this litany of maladies appears one • An award-winning this story is an urgent call to his audience the excruciating last moments of the victims’ lives. translation: Lara Vergnaud morning in the form of an excruciatingly painful response to touch, recognize our darker impulses With the perspicuity of Kafka’s The Trial and the obsessions of received the French Voices but only on the skin from her wrists to her shoulders. and avoid repeating the past. Delillo’s White Noise, The Memory Monster confronts difficult questions Award Grand Prize in 2018 for Embarking on a dizzying and frustrating cycle of doctors, • A captivating literary parable: that are all too relevant to Israel and the world today: How do we her translation. specialists, procedures, and therapists, seventeen-year-old Ninon A great pick for book clubs. process human brutality? What makes us choose sides in conflict? And • Introduction by Catherine becomes consumed by her need to rationalize her pain and end how do we honor the memory of horror without becoming consumed Lacey: Award-winning author • A growing profile: Sarid has the curse. As Ninon tries to break free from the life she’s been been shortlisted for the Dublin by it? of Nobody Is Ever Missing, The IMPAC Prize and Germany’s conditioned to accept and reclaim both her body and her future, Life Answers, Certain American International Literature Prize. Sciences provocatively questions our understanding of illness, health, States, and Pew. His next novel, Victorious, will and the female condition. • A triumph of determination be published by Restless in YISHAI SARID (b. 1965) was born and raised in Tel over determinism: Ninon 2022. Aviv, Israel. The author of six acclaimed novels that pushes back against the dismissal of her symptoms and have been translated into ten languages, Sarid is one JOY SORMAN is a novelist and documentarian who lives and works the frustrating all-too-common of Israel’s most prominent contemporary writers. in Paris. She published her first novelBoys, boys, boys in 2005 which experience of having one’s pain was awarded the Prix de Flore. In 2013, she received the Prix François invalidated, misunderstood, or Mauriac from l’Académie française for Comme un bête. ignored.
6 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 fall 2021 winter 2022 | restless books 7 Rue des Dames; she’s gone through puberty, by an act—if her daughter were to con- of uncustomary discomfort, of irritation is fairly average, 5'4, 120 pounds, 34A, some template climbing Everest without oxygen, and soon pain that pulls her from her sleep, acne, unwanted hair tamed, a brunette, Esther Moise would undoubtedly feel no like a bad dream that leaves a bitter after- girlfriends, acceptable grades, the occa- surprise, no joy, not even worry. taste and crust in the eyes, a disagreeable sional swim, movie theater, mall, cigarette, posture that stiffens the body during the vodka-OJ, parties and stolen kisses, nothing No warning sign will be detected, no alert, night, an inflammation of the nerves of the From Life Sciences more. Average, reserved, ordinary-looking, no malfunction or change in Ninon’s gen- kind brought on by stormy weather. It takes sometimes to the despair of a mother who’s eral state able to signal the affliction that Ninon a few seconds to emerge from this secretly waiting for Ninon to be chosen, a finally strikes. If this affliction had been dis- disagreeable torpor, a few seconds for body mother who could be judged as misguided, creetly advancing through the silence and and mind to reconnect, crackling, for her Ninon Moise turns three, seven, eleven, reckless even, torn between the relief of obscurity of her organs, she hadn’t heard bedroom to take form again—south-facing doesn’t suffer from any ailments, no disease knowing her daughter to be in good health it. No notable event either, no trauma or window, gray carpet, an Ikea desk in light has manifested, nothing suspicious, a rather and the impatience of seeing her struck in accident liable to have triggered the disease. pine—and then comes the urgent, imposing cheerful child, lulled by baleful and comical her turn, curious to learn what fate and the That’s how it is, today’s the day, you need a sensation of the sheetHardcover on List her Price: skin. $22 accounts, though she’s somewhat solitary, inexhaustible resources of the genome have beginning, a date, an age, it’s a January nine- Lying in the fetalISBN: 9781632062239position, body huddled Publication: 5/26/2020 like her mother, the solitude of a little girl in store for her. Esther Moise always told teenth, in the morning when she wakes up. up beneath the 5”comforter, x 7.125” • 240 Ninonpages is wear- whose head is full of tales as captivating as Ninon her genealogical sagas with such It won’t be gradual, it won’t be underlying ing pajama pantsMemoir: and Motherhooda tank top, / Childbirth and the/ Women / Feminism they are burdensome, whose heart some- enthusiasm, irrigating her daughter’s young then exponential until it fully manifests; the contact of the sheetRights onHeld: her World naked, English exposed times tightens in worry—when will misfor- malleable and porous brain with legends, anomaly and the pain are absent from her arms is extraordinary,eBook ISBN:9781632062246 she can’t feel any- tune strike? what will its name be?—though because she herself had never been unhappy body on January eighteenth, and present the thing else, it weighs• Marketing heavy bullet(lead), it burns she’s also awaiting it with some excitement. or overburdened by the disease that struck nineteenth, revealed, and when her trou- (acid), it chafes (sandpaper),• Marketing bullet her two pained Ninon isn’t traumatized by these cruel her, awareness of her uniqueness largely bling and unusual symptoms appear, Ninon arms seem enormous• Marketing to her, bullet a brutal, crazy, stories, didn’t grow up any faster from hear- making up for the diminishment of her quickly understands that this is it, the thing impossible sensation• Marketing that matches bullet nothing ing them, or any slower, just a little more faculties—to the point that one could sus- she can no longer name now that she’s the she’s ever known.• Marketing bullet alert than other children her age, forever pect her of having wanted to get sick, to be host, the object, she knows perfectly well waiting for a sign, monitoring her own anointed by sickness, join an extraordinary that this malady didn’t land on her ran- In a burst of panic, Ninon jumps out of her body, an interior sentinel. Of course this lineage, remove herself from the anonymous domly, that it didn’t come out of nowhere, bed like it’s on fire, rolls onto the carpet, attentiveness sometimes prompts bouts of masses, and have a destiny, consolations in but from a slowly formed bed of history and which likewise burns her skin, lays still on hypochondria, but most often she floats which Ester Moise had always taken pride. time, from layers of pathological strata—so, her back, holds her arms above her, pre- carefree in a cloudy zone where the fictions It’s therefore time for her daughter to on this nineteenth of January, in the morn- pared to find them red, scratched, bleeding told by her mother blend with real life, with stand out, and it’s as though that distinc- ing, existence as she knows it suddenly van- maybe, her skin raw, flayed, but nothing, life waiting to be lived. tiveness can only be revealed through her ishes, an underground life takes power, the the epidermis is smooth and white and the genes, as though uniqueness can only be hereditary poison spreads through her body. pain recedes as quickly as it appeared, like a Ninon is seventeen, a senior at Jules Ferry expressed by a cell line, as though the force Normally it’s the Rihanna ringtone on hallucination gone without a trace. High School, in Paris’s Place de Clichy, of a person’s existence is resorbed whole by her cellphone—Bitch better have my money— on the literature track, she’ll take her final the transmission of genetic characteristics that wakes her at seven a.m., but this morn- exams soon, lives with her mother in a hoped to be rare and mysterious, as though ing she opened her eyes a little earlier, the three-room Hausmannian building on the that force can’t be incarnated, for example, bluish screen indicates 6:39 and it’s a feeling
8 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 fall 2021 winter 2022 | restless books 9 NOVEMBER From Mud Sweeter than Honey holiday resorts. We spent our time at work- Mud Sweeter than Honey ers’ holiday camps or in a tent. Margo Rejmer Once I asked my aunt to send me some Here in Shkodër there were constant Translated from the Polish by shoes. And wanting to make me happy, she rumors that Hoxha, the Red Pharaoh, was Zosia Krasodomska-Jones and Antonia Lloyd-Jones found me something special: some orange growing weaker, and when he died, the Introduction by Tony Barber pumps. When I opened the parcel, I was so bolder people among us joked: “There’s so amazed I had to sit down. My darling, naive little meat they’ve probably sliced him up for A revelatory oral history of the people who suffered, auntie, she really had no idea about life in cold cuts by now.” rebelled, and survived under the dictatorship of Albania! Everything around us was the color “At least that’s one communist fewer,” Enver Hoxha in communist Albania, one of the of dust, dirt and grime, while that orange we sighed. twentieth century’s most brutal and Kafkaesque color was a challenge to the predators: “Go Something did change. At last the author- regimes. get her!” In Albania, those shoes were more ities began to worry that the people wouldn’t For nearly half a century Albania was held captive by one man. A cruel conspicuous than a pair of Martians would put up with the poverty anymore and would Hardcover List Price: US $28.00 dictator with a deep paranoid streak, Enver Hoxha sealed the country’s have been, but I didn’t have any others, so finally rebel, so theyHardcover loosened List Price: their $22 grip. borders, severed alliances, and enacted a totalitarian regime of gulags ISBN: 9781632062833 More and moreISBN: 9781632062239people came out of Publication: Nov 2, 2021 and purges. Many thousands suffered and died in silence, a silence that I had to wear them. They instantly caught Publication: 5/26/2020 6" x 9" • 304 pages lingers today: Thirty years after the end of Hoxha’s regime, its victims the eye of the shift manager at the factory. prison, and it was5” x 7.125”easier • 240 and pages easier to go Nonfiction: Reportage / Polish / are still waiting for justice. to college. TheMemoir: terror Motherhood lessened, / Childbirth but / the Albania / Dictatorship / Communism She hinted that she could really do with a Women / Feminism Rights Held: North America, Audio In Mud Sweeter than Honey, Albanians break the silence. Margo pair of shoes like those, but I pretended not hunger grew. WeRights made Held: World everything English our- Rejmer spent years in Albania gathering interviews that shed light eBook ISBN: 9781632062840 selves—cheese, eBookbread, ISBN:9781632062246 butter—because at on the four decades of Hoxha’s rule and virtually every walk of life: to understand what she was talking about. • In the tradition of Svetlana teachers and children, imprisoned and exiled writers, nuns and factory The next day she fired me for imperialistic the market you could• Marketing only buy bullet chives. Peo- Alexievich: The result of years workers. She arranges the voices of her interlocutors into a chorus that extravagance in the way I dressed! In place ple became obsessed• Marketing with food, bullet and didn’t spent immersed in Albania, the bears witness to how ordinary people lived and died. We are immersed book captures the testimonies of the factory, I was sent to work at the mar- think twice about• Marketingstealing. bulletIn those days I in desperate border crossings, prison revolts, and everyday struggles of survivors with rigor, depth, ket, alongside the Albanian gypsies. was working at a• state-ownedMarketing bullet florist’s, and and startling intimacy. to make a living. We meet a writer who finds secret freedom in a tiny village library of banned books, overlooked by censors. We meet a man Yes, opening those parcels from Italy time and again I• managedMarketing to bullet swap an illicit • An unparalleled look inside “Europe’s North Korea”: who still only speaks in a whisper, afraid of being overheard. gave us brief moments of happiness. Hap- bouquet for a piece of cheese . . . No other book available in While Albanians endured surveillance, imprisonment, and torture piness was also eating something other than Sometimes I thought Albania had gone under Hoxha, they also read books and fell in love, raised families and English offers such a detailed and that the country had collapsed, but account of life during Hoxha’s found ways to survive. In the tradition of Svetlana Alexievich, Mud bread and cheese. Happiness was going to dictatorship. Sweeter than Honey is our most vivid, intimate portrait available in the beach and bathing in Lake Shkodër. We some evil people who wanted to cling onto • An important new literary English of this little-understood corner of Europe. needed special documents to do that, and power at any cost were trying to convince us voice: This is the English- the inspectors always ransacked our bas- that the state still existed. Once when I was language debut of one of Poland’s most acclaimed young MAŁGORZATA (MARGO) REJMER is an award- kets, prodding every tomato and fingering on my way home along the road by the lake, writers of reportage. winning Polish novelist, reporter, and writer of short I saw something floating on the surface of stories. She is the author of the novel Toximia and the cheese. We only had fifteen days’ leave • Simultaneous UK publication: the nonfiction work Bucharest:Dust and Blood, which a year and we went on holiday when the the water. I went closer. They were books, Shared publication with won the Newsweek Award for best book of 2014 and MacLehose Press in the UK will state decided we could: once in May, once books by our beloved leader, the dead, yet the Gryfia Literary Award. In 2018 she was awarded generate international buzz. the Polityka Passport, the most prestigious prize in in September and once in February. Holi- immortal Enver Hoxha! I looked around Poland for emerging artists, for Mud Sweeter than Honey. Her books have days were a privilege and a reward: for the anxiously. I was afraid something bad might been translated into eight languages. She lives in Warsaw and Tirana. workers, for the administration and for the happen to me, so to be on the safe side, I Sigurimi. The deserving few had their own went to see the factory manager. 10 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 fall 2021 winter 2022 | restlessContinues books ➛11 Mud Sweeter than Honey continued FEBRUARY
“Comrade Manager, I saw the works of And yet . . . So many years have gone by, but The Murders of Moisés Ville our Supreme Comrade thrown into a lake!” my terror is still lurking in the background. Javier Sinay But the manager merely said: “I see. Go When we came in here, to this café, I looked Translated from the Spanish by Robert Croll back to work.” around, and I was pleased to see we were He didn’t ask where or when, what alone. I picked the most secluded table, Award-winning journalist Javier Sinay investigates books or which lake. I thought I saw the and then I took a good look at your clothes: a series of murders from the nineteenth century, faintest hint of a smile on his face. And then where might you have a bug hidden? Even unearthing the complex history and legacy of I understood: Albania as we knew it was at though you told me you’d be recording. I Moisés Ville, the “Jerusalem of South America,” and an end. laid out these books about communism in his personal connection to a little-known period of Jewish history in Argentina. Finally, on September 27, 1990, I went front of you and I thought: “It’s lucky no cover abroad for the first time in my life, to Ven- one can see us.” So many years have passed, In 2009, journalist Javier Sinay discovered an article from 1947, written not ice, to visit our dear aunt who had saved us and my thinking is still guided by terror, it’s by his great-grandfather Mijl Hacohen Sinay, detailing twenty-two final with her parcels for all those years. The ship still there inside me. murders that had occurred in Moisés Ville at the end of the nineteenth century. What starts as an investigation into these murders turns Hardcover List Price: US $28.00 was beautiful, clean and luxurious, but the Once, in 1992, I went to a government ISBN: 9781632062987 into a deeper exploration of the history of Moisés Ville—one of the Publication: Feb 8, 2022 people on board were from another world— office and accidentally found myself in an first Jewish agricultural communities in Argentina—and Sinay’s own 6" x 9" • 304 pages all they had with them was bread, cheese, empty room, where there were stacks of connection to this Jewish epicenter. Nonfiction: History / True Crime / Jewish / Yiddish / Immigration / and tomatoes. The man next to me trembled official files and piles of documents lying on Seeking refuge from the pogroms of Czarist Russia, a group of Jewish immigrants founded Moisés Ville in the late 1880s. Like their town’s Argentina / 19th Century South throughout the journey. the floor. I picked up one of them:In Koplik, America prophetic namesake, these immigrants fled one form of persecution Rights Held: World English, Audio “You don’t realize,” he whispered, “but sixteen people are painting eggs red for Easter. only to encounter a different set of hardships: exploitative land eBook ISBN: 9781632062994 they can turn us back at any moment.” Neat, rounded letters . . . A message from a prices, starvation, illness, language barriers, and a series of murders • When an Italian sailor said: “Have a bygone world. perpetrated by roving gauchos who preyed upon their vulnerability. Award-winning author’s Sinay, though a descendant of these immigrants, is unfamiliar with this English-language debut: good trip!” I muttered: “Go to hell!” because Lots of people will tell you that com- turbulent history, and his research into the spate of violence plunges Javier Sinay is the recipient of the 2015 Gabriel García the only thought in the back of my mind munism in Albania hasn’t ended, because him into his family’s past. Márquez Prize and the 2010 was that a man in uniform means violence the same characters are still in power and He combs through archives in search of documents about the Rodolfo Walsh Prize murders and hires a book detective to track down issues of Der and trouble. nobody has really been punished. What is • A true crime investigation Viderkol, the first Yiddish newspaper in Argentina started by his Physically, my mother lived in Shko- democracy? Voting should be free, shouldn’t turns personal: Sinay delves great-grandfather. Through interviews with his family members, current into his own family history dër but mentally she spent her whole life it? And yet people here vote because some- residents of Moisés Ville, historians, and archivists, Sinay compiles as he investigates a series of in Venice. When I went there, I felt as if one from a particular party got them a job, moving portraits of the victims of these heinous murders and reveals nineteenth-century murders I were returning to a familiar city, because because someone gave them fifty euros, or the fascinating, complex history of the town once known as the • The fascinating rise and “Jerusalem of South America.” fall of “South America’s my mother had told me about every build- because there’s something in it for them. Jerusalem”: A complex history ing, every square and alleyway, every trip in Nowadays anyone can get away from here, JAVIER SINAY is a writer and journalist based of assimilation, confrontation, in Buenos Aires. His books include Camino al Este, and transformation a gondola; I had always dreamed of ending but where are they going to go? Nobody Cuba Stone (co-authored), and Sangre joven, which • An intimate exploration up in the land of her stories. wants Albanians in their country. won the Rodolfo Walsh Prize. In 2015 he was of Yiddish: Sinay immerses And it came true. With the fall of com- In the past, if you held your tongue you awarded the Gabriel García Márquez Prize for his himself in the rich history, article “Rápido. Furioso. Muerto” (“Fast. Furious. literature, and enduring vitality munism, I regained control of my life. I were safe. These days you can scream, but no Dead”) published in Rolling Stone. The Murders of of the Yiddish language could sing Italian songs whenever I wanted. one will hear you. Moisés Ville is his first book in English. — 12 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 fall 2021 winter 2022 | restless books 13 AUGUST Rat Rule 79 Chapter Zero ot long ago and not far away, in fact right here in the living room, there was a girl named Fred. Rivka Galchen Fred was not being chased by wolves. She was Nnot battling an intergalactic clan of space pirates. She did Illustrated by Elena Megalos not have ESP, she could not levitate, she was not an expert swordswoman, and she did not eat lightning. You might say Fred was a pretty normal girl—even if her favorite sandwich was peanut butter and pickles on raisin bread. “Rivka Galchen delivers joy and cleverness Even if nothing unusual had ever happened to her, I would care deeply about Fred. I would care about her simply because she was, and is, Fred. reminiscent of The Phantom Tollbooth, Alice Yet some unusual things did happen. in Wonderland, and Hayao Miyazaki movies” (NPR, Best Books of 2019) in Rat Rule 79—now in paperback.
“We have been waiting for this book our entire lives.” —Lemony Snicket The Surprising 3 Dungeon Chapter “I love this book. It’s a wonder. I wish I’d had Rat Rule 79 when I was Without Assigned Paperback List Price: US $15.00 Number ISBN: 9781632061027 a boy.” —James Gleick, author of The Information 2019/6/17 下午12:01 Publication: Aug 10, 2021 Page 2- Fred.indd 1 id I mention that Fred was wearing fluffy bunny 5.5" x 8.25" • 256 pages “Rat Rule 79 is an impossibly perfect book.” slippers? And planet pajamas? Which was perfectly 2-color illustrations fine for going to sleep but would not be Fred’s —Karen Russell, author of Swamplandia Dpreferred attire for social appearances. Fred found herself, in Middle Grade Fiction: Fantasy / her pajamas and slippers, in a small, sunny room. Or rather, it was a damp and dark room with a small high window Adventure / Coming of Age • Ages that let in the light. The room looked just like what Fred 10+ imagined a dungeon looked like, in those stories where “Full of intelligence, warmth, and wit. A page-turner in its own people keep finding themselves in dungeons, often with a Rights Held: North America pile of hay in the corner. Why hay? As if dungeons were right!” —Gary Shteyngart, author of Super Sad True Love Story places for badly behaved horses. Anyhow, coming through eBook ISBN: 9781632061003 that window were those rays of sunshine that can make a window seem like a portal to another world. If you’re in that kind of mood. • A memorable mother- Fred and her mom are always on the move, and Fred is getting sick of it. “Well, this is surprising,” Fred said aloud to herself. “Nice slippers,” said another voice. daughter relationship: At its She’s about to have yet another birthday in a new place without friends. “Thanks, I don’t usually—” Then she was confused and heart, this is a story of intense On the eve of turning thirteen, Fred sees something strange in the living embarrassed and looking around for the source of the voice. love between a preteen girl and room: her mother, dressed for a party, standing in front of an enormous 15 her hardworking single mom. paper lantern—which she steps into and disappears. Page 14 - Downer.indd 1 2019/6/17 下午12:09 Rat Rule 79 PB_replacement pages.indd 2 • Beloved by booksellers: Fred follows her and finds herself in the Land of Impossibility—a 5/11/21 12:33 The hardcover was a Fall 2019 loopily illogical place where time has been outlawed by a mad Kids’ Indie Next list pick and Rat Queen, along with birthday parties and, most cruelly, peanut garnered glowing reviews from butter. Fred meets Downer, a downcast white elephant, and Gogo, a booksellers. pugnacious mongoose mother of seventeen, who help her in her quest • Timed for the release of to find her mom. Galchen’s second novel: Rat Rule 79 is an instant classic for curious readers of all ages. Galchen’s fans waited thirteen years for Everyone Knows Your Mother is a Witch (FSG, Jun 8, RIVKA GALCHEN is an award-winning fiction 2021). Her many adult readers writer and journalist. She is the author of three will be happy to discover her books: Atmospheric Disturbances, American only book for young readers. Innovations, and Little Labors. She has received numerous prizes and fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Rona Jaffe Fellowship, and The Berlin Prize. In 2010, she was named to The New Yorker’s list of 20 Writers Under 40.
14 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022
2019/6/17 下午12:13 2019/6/17 1 Gogo.indd - 39 Page SEPTEMBER
In the forest, where sunlight falls gently through the leaves, live busy Little Bird, mighty Elephant, speedy Rabbit, funny Monkey— and me, Slow Lizard.
It’s OK, Slow Lizard Yeorim Yoon Illustrated by Jian Kim Translated by Chi-Young Kim
Hardcover List Price: US $18.95 In a lush, sun-dappled forest, animal friends ISBN: 9781632062772 4/23/21 20:10 discover the advantages of living slowly, in this 4/23/21 20:10 It's OK, Slow Lizard_interior.indd 7 Publication: Sep 28, 2021 It's OK, Slow Lizard_interior.indd 6 9.45" × 8.67" • 42 pages soothing picture book from beloved South Korean 4-color illustrations author and illustrator Yeorim Yoon and Jian Kim. I sit quietly next to Rabbit. Children’s Fiction: Picture Book / With a friend nearby, Rabbit slowly feels better. Korea / Animals / Emotions • Little Bird is all aflutter—too many things to do. Elephant cries with Ages 3–6 Rights Held: World English frustration when a shoelace breaks. Rabbit tries so hard and loses the
akes. eBook ISBN: 9781632062789 race anyway. But what about Slow Lizard? K to make mist .” “It’s O t win to no It’s OK
• Reclaiming “slow” as a Just like my name, I live a slow, slow life. positive quality: For readers And because I live a slow life, used to hearing “slow” used I see many things, negatively in our ultrafast world, this is a much-needed I hear many things, celebration. and I have lots of time to help my friends. • Beautiful, meaningful illustrations: Readers are Meandering through a sunny forest, Slow Lizard’s friends learn how It's OK, Slow Lizard_interior.indd 20
4/23/21 20:10 invited to take their time to wonderful it is to slow down together. Filled with blooming trees and It's OK, Slow Lizard_interior.indd 21 spot little details hidden on fluffy flower beds,It’s OK, Slow Lizard glows with the beauty of a hidden 4/23/21 20:10 the pages, creating a mindful magical world, where we take the time to help each other enjoy life— reading experience. even when the rain comes. • Opening new worlds through international picture books: Award-winning translator YEORIM YOON is from Ulsan, South Korea. Chi-Young Kim gives English- Do you think my friends She is a former editor of children’s books at are glad that I’m around? language readers the chance to various publishers as well as at the Samsung I’m glad I have my friends too. encounter the work of Yeorim Children’s Museum in Seoul. She currently Yoon and Jian Kim, beloved lives in San Diego, where she leads a life that is children’s book creators from both busy and slow as a mother and author of South Korea. children’s books.
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It's OK, Slow Lizard_interior.indd 26 16 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 RECENTLY PUBLISHED RECENTLY PUBLISHED
Winner of the 2020 European Union Prize for Literature
Antiman Catch the Rabbit The Wild Book Good Night, Earth Rajiv Mohabir Lana Bastašić Juan Villoro Linda Bondestam “Antiman lives, breathes, and dances in unbridled “This unforgettable tour de force surprises at “Deserving a place beside classics like The Phantom “A droll and imaginative addition to the crepuscular joy.” —Thomas Glave, author of The Torturer’s Wife every turn.”—Publishers Weekly, Starred Review Tollbooth and Half-Magic.” —Foreword Reviews corpus.” —Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review
Hardcover List Price: US $27 Paperback List Price: US $18 Paperback List Price: US $17 Hardcover List Price: US $20 ISBN: 9781632062802 • 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 352 pages ISBN: 9781632062895 • 5" x 7.125" • 256 pages ISBN: 9781632061461 • 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 240 pages ISBN: 9781632062864 • 8.25˝ x 5.85˝ • 48 pages • 4-color illustrations Nonfiction: Memoir—Guyana / Immigration / Sexuality / Fiction: Bosnia / Friendship / Feminism / Language / War B&W illustrations Children’s Fiction: Picture Book / Swedish / Bedtime / Humor • Ages 3–6 Borders / Identity / Language Rights Held: North America, Audio Middle Grade Fiction: Books & Libraries • Ages: 10–14 Rights Held: World English, Audio • eBook ISBN: 9781632062871 Rights Held: World, Audio, Film / TV eBook ISBN: 9781632062901 Rights Held: World • eBook ISBN: 9781632061485 eBook ISBN: 9781632062819
FORTHCOMING
Kirkus Reviews A Junior Best Nonfiction Library Guild of 2020 Gold Standard Selection
A Kids’ Indie Next Pick
Nine Moons Machiavelli: On Politics and Power Gabriela Wiener Niccolò Machiavelli Temple Alley Summer Middlemarch Sachiko Kashiwaba George Eliot “It’s the sort of book you will read and pass on Paperback List Price: US $20 to your friends with a note that says TRUST ISBN: 9781632062567 “An instant classic filled with supernatural intrigue and Paperback List Price: US $24 • ISBN: 9781632063069 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 320 pages • B&W illustrations Publication: Sep 14, 2021 • 6˝ x 9˝ • 784 pages ME taped to the cover.” —New York Magazine real-world friendship.” —Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review Political Science: Government / Italy / Philosophy B&W illustrations Rights Held: World Paperback List Price: US $18 Hardcover List Price: US $18 • ISBN: 9781632063038 Classics: British Fiction / Victorian / Women / Class eBook ISBN: 9781632062574 ISBN: 9781632060730 • 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 208 pages Publication: Jul 6, 2021 • 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 240 pages • B&W illustrations Rights Held: World Memoir: Motherhood / Childbirth / Women / Feminism Middle Grade Fiction: Japan / Mystery / Fantasy / Legend eBook ISBN: 9781632063076 Rights Held: World English • eBook ISBN: 9781632062246 Rights Held: World English, Audio • eBook ISBN: 9781632063045
18 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 fall 2021 winter 2022 | restless books 19 YONDER HIGHLIGHTS RESTLESS CLASSICS HIGHLIGHTS
USBBY 2021 World Literature Outstanding Today’s 75 Notable International Translations of 2020 Book
Robinson Crusoe Night and Day Passing Daniel Defoe Virginia Woolf Nella Larsen 1,001 Creatures Ellie’s Voice, or Trööömmmpffff Introduction by Jamaica Kincaid Introduction by Lauren Groff Introduction by Darryl Pinckney Laura Merz and Aino Järvinen Piret Raud Paperback List Price: US $19.99 Paperback List Price: US $22.99 Paperback List Price: US $19.99 Hardcover List Price: US $20 Hardcover List Price: US $18 ISBN: 9781632061195 ISBN: 9781632060327 ISBN: 9781632062024 ISBN: 9781632062680 • 9.65˝ x 11.73˝ • 64 pages ISBN: 9781632061911 • 6.75˝ x 9˝ • 40 pages 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 384 pages • B&W illustrations 6˝ x 9˝ • 480 pages • B&W illustrations 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 192 pages 4-color illustrations 2-color illustrations Fiction: Classics / World Literature / Caribbean Fiction: Classics / Victorian / English B&W illustrations Children’s Nonfiction Picture Book: Animals • Ages 6–9 Children’s Picture Book: Estonian / Friendship / / Adventure / Postcolonial Studies Literature Fiction: Classics / African American / Rights Held: World English Difference / Animals / Music • Ages 3–6 Rights Held: World Rights Held: World Harlem Renaissance / Race Relations eBook ISBN: 9781632062697 Rights Held: World English • eBook ISBN: eBook ISBN: 9781632061201 eBook ISBN: 9781632060334 Rights Held: World 9781632061430 eBook ISBN: 9781632062031
A 2019 Batchelder Honor Book
The Casket of Time Run For Your Life Ramayana The Souls of Black Folk Chekhov: Stories for Our Time Don Quixote Andri Snær Magnason Silvana Gandolfi Arshia Sattar W. E. B. Du Bois Anton Chekhov Cervantes Introduction by Vann R. Newkirk II Introduction by Boris Fishman Introduction by Ilan Stavans Hardcover List Price: US $17.99 Paperback List Price: US $15.99 Hardcover List Price: US $22.99 ISBN: 9781632062055 ISBN: 9781632061652 ISBN: 9781632061775 Paperback List Price: US $19.99 Paperback List Price: US $22.99 Paperback List Price: US $22.99 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 240 pages 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 288 pages 7.125˝ x 7.125˝ • 192 pages • 4-color ISBN: 9781632060976 ISBN: 9781632061805 ISBN: 9781632060754 Middle Grade Fiction: Adventure / Fairy Young Adult Fiction: Thriller / Mafia illustrations 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 272 pages • B&W illustrations 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 384 pages • B&W illustrations 6˝ x 9˝ • 960 pages • B&W illustrations Tale / Science Fiction / Mythology / Ages 12–18 Young Adult Fiction: Classics / Hindu Epics Sociology: African-American Studies / Classics: Russian Literature / Short Stories Fiction: Classics / Spanish Literature / Environmentalism • Ages 10+ Rights Held: World English • Ages 10+ Discrimination and Race Relations Rights Held: World Picaresque Rights Held: World English eBook ISBN: 9781632061669 Rights Held: World English excl. India Rights Held: World • Nonmerch eBook ISBN: 9781632061812 Rights Held: World eBook ISBN: 9781632062062 eBook ISBN: 9781632061782 eBook ISBN: 9781632060983 eBook ISBN: 9781632060808
20 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 fall 2021 winter 2022 | restless books 21 RIGHTS HIGHLIGHTS RIGHTS HIGHLIGHTS
Foreword Indie Foreword Indie Choice Award Choice Award 2020 Gold Winner 2020 Silver for Multicultural Winner for Anthologies 2020 Mass Book Awards Must Read Fiction
Popol Vuh How Yiddish Changed America and How Temporary People The Boy Glory and Its Litany of Horrors Ilan Stavans America Changed Yiddish Deepak Unnikrishnan Marcus Malte Fernanda Torres Hardcover List Price: US $22 Edited by Ilan Stavans and Josh Lambert Paperback List Price: US $17.99 Paperback List Price: US $22.99 Paperback List Price: US $17.99 ISBN: 9781632062406 • 6˝ x 6˝ • 224 pages Hardcover List Price: US $29.99 ISBN: 9781632061423 ISBN: 9781632061713 ISBN: 9781632061126 4-color illustrations ISBN: 9781632062628 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 256 pages 6˝ x 9˝ • 480 pages 5˝ x 7.125˝ • 240 pages Fiction: Myth / Classics / Latin American / Retelling 6˝ x 9˝ • 512 pages Fiction: Middle East—United Arab Fiction: Historical—early 20th Century Fiction: Brazilian / Humorous / Literary Rights Held: World Cultural History: Jewish / Yiddish / Anthology Emirates / Immigration / Globalism / / Coming of Age / War Novel / Love Rights Held: World English eBook ISBN: 9781632062413 Rights Held: World Literary Story / France eBook ISBN: 9781632061133 eBook ISBN: 9781632062635 Rights Held: World Rights Held: World English eBook ISBN: 9781632061447 eBook ISBN: 9781632061720
2019 Winner of the Mass Book Award for Nonfiction
The City of Good Death Bug The Body Papers My Part of Her Silence of the Chagos Priyanka Champaneri Giacomo Sartori Grace Talusan Javad Djavahery Shenaz Patel Beyond the Rice Fields Naivo Hardcover List Price: US $28.00 Paperback List Price: US $18.00 Paperback List Price: US $17.99 Paperback List Price: US $17.99 Paperback List Price: US $17.99 ISBN: 9781632062529 ISBN: 9781632062741 ISBN: 9781632060242 ISBN: 9781632062437 ISBN: 9781632062345 Paperback List Price: US $19.99 6˝ x 9˝ • 448 pages 5˝ x 7.125˝ • 320 pages 5˝ x 7.125˝ • 272 pages 5˝ x 7.125˝ • 256 pages 5˝ x 7.125˝ • 178 pages ISBN: 9781632061317 Fiction: India / Family Saga Fiction: Italian / Family Saga / Nonfiction: Memoir—Family / Trauma / Fiction: Iran / France / Revolution Fiction: Mauritian / Geopolitics / Indigenous 5.5˝ x 8.25˝ • 368 pages Rights Held: World English Humorous / Technology Immigration / Filipino Culture / Rights Held: World English Peoples / Family / Immigration / Activist Fiction: Historical / Africa / 19th Century eBook ISBN: 9781632062543 Rights Held: World English, Audio Rights Held: World eBook ISBN: 9781632062444 Rights Held: World English Rights Held: World English eBook ISBN: 9781632062758 eBook ISBN: 9781632061843 eBook ISBN: 9781632062352 eBook ISBN: 9781632061324
22 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 fall 2021 winter 2022 | restless books 23 PROGRAMS
Ordering Information
Restless Books is distributed internationally by Publishers Group West
BOOKSELLERS Submit orders to your sales representative or via IPS Cart on iPage. Call (866) 400-5351 • Fax (800) 838-1149 JOIN OUR NEW VIRTUAL BOOK CLUB e-mail [email protected] • IPS SAN: 6318630 If you’re looking for a way to connect with other literature lovers and find new National Accounts: Call (800) 343.4499 or e-mail [email protected] sustenance in your bookshelves—like we are—we invite you to join our virtual book club, Restless Reads. Together with the New York Public Library and the EDUCATORS AND LIBRARIANS Jones Library in Amherst, MA, we’re looking to great books from other times For desk and exam copy requests, please visit Ingram Academic. Contact Alison Gore for comfort, insight, and community. ([email protected]) with any questions regarding desk or exam copy requests.
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Free writing classes to inspire immigrants to tell their own immigrant stories. The See all catalogs at restlessbooks.org/catalog workshops involve reading, responding to short immigrant narratives, and writing exercises led by experienced teachers. Classes are conducted in English and meet weekly for five 90-minute sessions.
24 restless books | fall 2021 winter 2022 Restless Books 232 3rd St, Suite A101, Brooklyn, NY 11215 restlessbooks.org • @restlessbooks bit.ly/RestlessNewsletter