JUDY BUDNITZ

En Si yo te dijera, Judy Budnitz narra la historia de cuatro generaciones de mujeres, desde el corazón de la Europa del Este hasta el bloque de pisos de una ciudad norteamericana. La joven e inquieta Ilana, ansiosa por escapar del mundo cerrado y asfixiante en el que nacio y crecio, emprende una suerte de viaje iniciatico, atravesando los tenebrosos bosques cercanos a su pueblo natal, en los que acechan criaturas semifantasticas y personajes de lo mas variopinto, y se embarca hacia Estados Unidos. A traves de ella, la autora tira del hilo y consigue que se sucedan las historias contadas por sus descendientes: su hija, su nieta y su bisnieta. Es esta una novela sobre esas historias que pasan de madres a hijas, y que poco a poco adquieren el estatus de leyendas. Con un estilo muy personal, la autora elabora un relato original, una extraordinaria combinacion de magia y realismo al estilo de las narraciones surgidas del folclore centroeuropeo.

Un relato inolvidable, con la fuerza de nuestro tiempo y la magia de las leyendas centroeuropeas. La joven e inquieta llana, ansiosa por escapar del mundo asfixiante, cruel y violento en el que se ha criado, huye de su pueblo, en la Europa del Este. Atravesando tenebrosos bosques en los que acechan criaturas semifantásticas, embarcará hacia América en busca del Edén. Allí se encontrará con la dura realidad del mundo civilizado.

Estos doce relatos son imposibles de olvidar. Nos llevan del corazón de América a una ciudad en guerra del Este de Europa; conocemos a una madre que quiere a toda costa que el bebé que espera nazca en Estados Unidos, o como una mamografia puede desatar una oscura comedia de identidades; bucea, por ejemplo, en los sentimientos que genera la esposa por catalogo de un amigo o en la reaccion de unos padres ante un hijo que es muy diferente de como lo esperaban

En esta brillante novela sobre las historias que se transmiten de madres a hijas, Judy Budnitz sigue a cuatro generaciones de mujeres desde un pueblo de la Europa del Este hasta una ciudad de Estados Unidos. La joven e inquieta protagonista, ansiosa por escapar del mundo cerrado y asfixiante en el que nacio y crecio, emprende una suerte de viaje inciatico hacia el Nuevo Mundo. A traves de ella, la autora consigue que se sucedan las historias contadas por sus descendientes: su hija, su nieta y su bisnieta. La autora elabora un relato original, una extraordinaria combinacion de magia y realismo al estilo de las leyendas centroeuropeas. Encuadernacion: Cartone.

A blazingly original, profoundly moving new work of fiction by a writer whose worldand imaginationknows no boundaries. I dont know what planet Judy Budnitz comes from, said Newsweek on the publication of her fiction debut, Flying Leap, but Im happy to have her. Tremendous . . . funny, dark, adventurous, slanted, and enchanted. These twelve astonishingly inventive storieswhich take us into the heart of America and around the globe, from suburban backyards and swimming pools to war-torn streets and fallout sheltersare riveting, seductive, and impossible to forget.In Flush, a mammogram prompts a dark comedy of blurred identities between a mother and her two adult daughters. In Elephant and Boy, a surrogate mother-and-son bond, tinged with the erotic, is formed when a philanthropist attempts to civilize a young elephant handler. Nadia sounds the depths of a young womans complex feelings toward a friend s mail-order bride from Eastern Europe. Preparednessan Orwellian tale in Technicolorimagines rapture in the wake of imminent apocalypse. And in Where We Come From, a pregnant womans many failed attempts to cross the border do not lessen her resolve to give birth on U.S. soil to a nice big American baby.Magical, poignant, often transcendent, these are virtuoso modern fables that mine our stores of hidden urges, misunderstandings, and blind passions, inviting us on a voyage through places and times at once deeply familiar and wondrously strange.

The astonishing Orange Prize-shortlisted debut from the author of Flying Leap and Nice Big American Baby. This is a truly strange and striking tale that begins in the deep, and deeply magical, European forest, in the world depicted in Chagalls paintings and Grimms Fairy Tales, and proceeds to tell the story of four generations of women from one fated family. Budnitz builds her book with wit and art somewhere in the gaps between magic realism, family saga and female bildungsroman. She marries great technical skill to quirky humour and dizzying metaphor. She has an uncanny knack for the destabilizing and indelible image, but does not abandon sense for sensibility. She is always readable, albeit strangely so. She might yet be an Americanized heir to the throne left vacant by Angela Carter.

Unforgettable and utterly affecting. You cant turn the pages fast enough Dave Eggers Judy Budnitz, author of the Orange Prize shortlisted novel If I Told You Once and the critically acclaimed collection Flying Leap. creates her own brand of stark, dystopian reality in this impressive collection of blisteringly inventive and surreal new stories. Budnitzs first-person narrators are pitch perfect, helping the reader to see from their perspective, no matter how odd it might be. Clever, comic and perpetually surprising, these are stories that demand to be read again and again. A truly talented young writer. Times

The Brothers Grimm take lessons in fiction from Angela Carter to produce this uncanny and surreal work. Judy Budnitz might just be the most exciting and unusual literary figure to emerge from the US literary thicket in 2000. She marries great technical skill to quirky humour and dizzying metaphor. She has an uncanny knack for the destabilizing and indelible image, but does not abandon sense for sensibility. She is always readable, albeit strangely so. She might yet be an Americanized heir to the throne left vacant by Angela Carter. This collection of stories is strikingly surreal and hugely entertaining. It will appeal to fans of everyone from Tibor Fischer via Lorrie Moore to Nicholson Baker, or put another way, from Heathers to Edward Scissorhands via Annie Hall. Among the storylines: a young man is persuaded to donate his heart to his dying mother; a girl comes of age in strange suburbia, her only friend a man dressed in a dogsuit; a man and a woman conduct a passionate love affair on a park bench.