Every Time We Say Goodbye

Description

A very remarkable book. It has been a long time since Ive wanted to proselytize about a new book as much as I do about Ivana SajkosEvery Time We Say Goodbye . . .Its formally and narratively thrilling, a very slim novel that conveys a whole pressurized life. The translation, by Mima Simi, is extraordinary.Garth Greenwell, author ofSmall RainA soliloquy of self-examination, upheaval, loss, hope, disillusionment, ambition and failureIvana Sajko paints a portrait of an intellectual at a crossroads.A man on a train, propelled from a small town on the south-eastern coast of Europe to Berlin. As the wheels turn, his mind feverishly clacks along, tracing his own pastand that of Europeto a moment of violence he must flee, moving him further and farther away from the one person he loves.Shipwrecks and border pushbacks; epidemics and industrial ruins; a family separated by economic necessity; a brother lost to crime; love and fear and memories of happier times in Berlinyet through it all runs a silver thread of hope spun by a far-off friend.Every Time We Say Goodbyeis an extended soliloquy of self-examination, upheaval, loss, hope, disillusionment, ambition, and failure, and is a profoundly stark and furious novel.Praise forEvery Time We Say GoodbyeA very remarkable book. It has been a long time since Ive wanted to proselytize about a new book as much as I do about Ivana SajkosEvery Time We Say Goodbye; its been a long time since a book by a new-to-me author has made me feel so much (to quote Dickinson) as if the top of my head were taken off. Its formally and narratively thrilling, a very slim novel that conveys a whole pressurized life. The translation, by Mima Simi, is extraordinary; the innovative prose lives and breathes in English.Garth Greenwell, author ofSmall RainThis one is, it must be said, unrelentingly grim, yet powerful in that grimness, packing a punch far beyond its 120 pages . . . Sajko writes in chapter-length sentences broken up only by commas. It takes a moment to register this, so fluid is the prosethe fluidity mirroring both the narrators stream of consciousness and the trains forward motion. As we move toward a key revelation about the narrators childhood during the Balkan War, Sajko braids the personal and political into something both artful and quietly unsettling.Emily Donaldson,Globe and MailReaders familiar with SajkosLove Novelwill remember the authors long, absorbing stream-of-consciousness sentences. InEvery Time We Say Goodbye, every chapter is a single sentence running for pages. The translator, Mima Simi, approaches her task inventively . . . the prose flows in sync with the protagonists thoughts: now rolling along, now jolting on the tracks, now braking hard.Anna Aslanyan,Times Literary Supplement[A] captivating new novel . . . translator Mima Simi shows great dexterity in her rendering of Sajkos lyrical, run-on sentences. They hurtle forward like a TGV, making manifest Iv.s struggle to speak of his despair and the continents.Ken Kalfus,New York TimesThe form suits the novels action, which involves a disillusioned Croatian journalist travelling by train to Berlin, where he reflects on a Europe in crisis, personal trauma and the losses that have left him alienated from his work, past and sense of belonging.Emily Donaldson,Globe and MailSajkos prosein Mimi Simis artful translationsharpens and resounds with deeply wrung emotion.Regan Mies,AsymptoteDont read this in an enclosed space. Sajkos prose leaves you no room to breathe. Each long, winding sentence yanks you through the memories of a man whose life is constrained by a succession of world crises. Ive never felt so useless in the face of history. I cant recommend this book enough.Evander Reyes,Electric LiteratureTranslated by Mima Simi, Sajkos longtime translator, the words inEvery Time We Say Goodbyeflow on the page like a river in springtime, so natural and powerful that readers might not realize they werent written in English. The sombre spirit is captured, the despair relayed, yet for all its bleakness this is not a depressing book . . . The river taking the reader this far has an energizing effect.Pamela Hensley,The Miramichi ReaderEvery sentence sings with emotional resonance and is imbued with the protagonists regret.Every Time We Say Goodbyeis a master class in both economy of language and expansiveness of feeling.Wendy J. Fox,Electric Literature[A] sharp, frenetic novel . . . hypnotic . . . The admixture of detail-specify and free-associative thought is a foundational strength of the novel, allowing Sajko to bring the reader into discrete moments with impressive verisimilitude and depth.D.W. White,LEspritSajko vividly captures the way in which travel suspends both time and place in scenes that are at once real and dreamlike . . . evoking generations of exile and migration, the inevitable aftershock of the wars and purges that have defined the Balkans.Every Time We Say Goodbyeis a threnody to leave-takingelegant, mournful, and profoundly human.Frank Wynne,Irish TimesHowever grim the subject matter, the writing remains exceptionally good, with long, majestic sentences that curl unpredictably around the subject. This profound novel is superbly translated by Simi, whose translators note is in itself fascinating.Declan ODriscoll,Irish TimesThe relentless nature of the narrative style heightens the emotional intensity of this novel, allowing for an in depth portrait of one mans past and present to emerge in a relatively limited space.Joseph Schreiber,roughghostsPropulsive . . . Mima Simi translates all of this with clarity and verve . . . The recalled episodes throughout are alternately riveting and heartbreaking.Ron Slate,On The SeawallA darkly meditative work from a strong and unflinching voice.Kirkus ReviewsSajkos blackhearted modernist novel is worth a look.Publishers Weekly[Sajkos] characteristic style resonates throughout the text in rapid changes of condensed scenes, concise and emotionally charged literary clusters of a confident pen for whom prose is always a measured experiment of rapids and explosions.Ana FazekasAs the unnamed protagonist travels from a Croatian to Berlin, the story unfolds in fragmented, single-sentence chapters that blur past and present, memory and movement. Sajko vividly paints the emotional burden of exile and migration through prose that is intense and devastating. Challenging but deeply rewarding, the novel captures the suspension of time that accompanies travel and loss, becoming a deeply moving meditation on humanity.Luisa Smith, Book Passage (Corte Madera, CA)I readEvery Time We Say Goodbyenot just in one sitting, but in a near-fugue state, completely absorbed in its stunning swirl of the personal and historical. Sajkos rippling stream of a narrative gives clarity to both the lingering power of departures and the inconclusive essence of arrivalsthis is a novel entirely built around transience, occupying both physical and interior spaces that are entirely in between. As haunting, lyrical, and affecting a book as you can find under 200 pages.Bryan Seitz, Literati Bookstore (Ann Arbor, MI)Centering around whatever the term for anti-nostalgia might be, a man presides over the shipwreck of a long, doomed relationship that he flees by taking a train north out of his home country and deep into Germany . . . Composed of long, ruminative, stream-of-conscious sentences, this chapter-less story moves back and forth in time. Its an effective portrayal of a good man with good intentions who is nonetheless flailing and failing along with the rest of good Europe . . . All the while Sajko deftly and subtly ties all of this all-too recognizable mans fate to the larger political landscape. This is powerful book from a brilliant writer.Douglas Riggs, Bank Square Books (Mystic, CT)A man on a train is leaving his life behind and traveling to Berlin as he examines his life and grapples with themes of lost love, war, violence, and belonging. The narrators stream of consciousness evokes the movement of the train on the tracks and completely swept me away with its rhythm and poignant language.Nikki Deal, Market Block Books (Troy, NY)Praise forLove NovelA devastating book, humane, original, and deeply relevant.Kirkus Reviews(starred review)A sharp and claustrophobic portrait of a fraying marriage . . . Sajko never takes her foot off the gas in this potent and incendiary outing.Publishers WeeklySajko takes no prisoners . . . [Love Novel] gloriously marries sociopolitical commentary on failed capitalism in a failed state to the inevitability of failed marriage, locating the narrative in an extraordinary violence of mind and body . . . Matching form with content, it depicts lives that involve walking constantly on tightropes with a ferocity of prose that allows no breathing space, consummately conveying the claustrophobic existence of the characters as external as well as personal circumstances close in on them.Dublin Literary Award Judges CitationLove Novelis a universal story about passion and poverty thats told in rich language.Suzanne Kamata,Foreword ReviewsLove Novelis not a comfortable read, but it is a timely exploration of socio-economic inequality, a raw confrontation of the pain humans are capable of inflicting on one another, and a fearless engagement with the challenges of poverty and parenthood.Helen Vassallo,Reading in Translation