Miss Tamara, the Reader Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić In this suite of eight stories, the three ages of woman—youth, midlife and senescence—engage in a complex and fruitful dance. A young Miss Tamara is lured by a series of postcards concealed in library books. A middle-aged Miss Tamara discovers that her new reading glasses […]

Amarcord Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić Ten linked stories with resonant titles explore almost every conceivable aspect of human memory: the positive and the negative, the precious and the profane, the heavenly and the unbearably hellish. Zivkovic’s deceptively simple tales anatomize the essence of what makes human beings tick, our passions, our vanities and […]

The Bridge Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić What is the link between red hair, a red bowling ball and a red bikini? Between an overcoat with asymmetrical lapels, a scarf with two blotches and a pair of non-matching sneakers? In this brainteasing trio of stories, Zoran Živković explores the collision of realities: a man […]

Twelve Collections Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić What lies behind the human urge to collect things? What is the true psychology of the kleptomaniac? These questions bear on all of us; within every person there lurks a fanatical philatelist or a monomaniacal lepidopterist, just waiting to burst forth. In his new story cycle, Twelve […]

Four Stories Till the End Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić In what strange edifice of the imagination do you find a condemned cell, a hotel room and a hospital room? What kind of hotel offers a zinc mine, a meat-packing plant, a weapons factory and a cemetery of famous artists among its attractions? Why […]

Steps Through the Mist Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić Five women of various ages face, each in her own way, what seems to be the deterministic trap of Fate: a freshman in a girls’ boarding school with the strange ability to share other people’s dreams; a young woman in a straitjacket, desperately trying to […]

Impossible Encounters Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić One of the most beloved “mosaic novels,” The Library presents a series of tales centered on our love of books—taken, at times, to extremes. A writer encounters a website where all his possible future books are on display; a lonely man faces an infinite flow of hardback […]

Impossible Encounters Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić Six strangely related stories about six encounters that could or should have never happened. A post mortem encounter with a clerk who has a most bizarre offer; an elusive encounter with oneself, only decades older; a seemingly innocent encounter with a bookshop visitor who is desperately looking […]

Time Gifts Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić A mysterious visitor comes to see three desperate human beings: an astronomer in his prison cell the night before his execution for the ultimate heresy; a paleolinguist with a wasted life behind her who has been forgotten by everybody in her dusty basement office; an old watchmaker […]

Hidden Camera Zoran ŽIVKOVIĆ translated by Alice Copple-Tošić A quiet, somewhat neurotic undertaker spends his days caring for his exotic fish, and of course his silent bodies as they arrive. One day, quite out of the ordinary, he receives a ticket to the movies. The movie, however, turns out to be of him, apparently filmed […]