Belletrista Issue 4

This is an archived issue of Belletrista. If you are looking for the current issue, you can find it here

Belletrista - A site promoting translated women authored literature from around the world


Meet Italy's Award-winning author Lia Levi in this interview with Paola Sergi.	Fifteen years old and All Grown Up? Rachael Beale takes us on an Orange Prize retrospective journey.	In Praise of New Zealand's Patricia Grace

Welcome to our fourth issue, and a further excursion into the wonderful world of literature! This time we feature an interview with Italy's celebrated Lia Levi, and we also introduce the works of Patricia Grace from New Zealand, Assia Djebar from Algeria, and two new authors, Maaza Mengiste and Nadifa Mohamed, from East Africa. Our very own Rachael Beale talks to some of the women behind the British Orange Prize in a retrospective piece. And just in case you don't have enough to read, we present 22 reviews of books by authors representing 17 different countries. Finally, we've included more than 60 original and distinctive titles from around the globe in the New and Notable section, for your browsing pleasure. We have thoroughly enjoyed producing this issue for you, and hope that you'll relish it!

Reviews
Below is a small tantalizing selection of this month's reviews....

INNOCENT WORLD

Ami Sakurai

Translated from the Japanese by Steven Clark

Innocent World may be a novella, but it generates the amount of discussion typical of tome-like novels or series. Its edgy content and even edgier messages led it to be passed around my workplace like contraband...
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Reviewed by Caitin Fehir

MOONLIGHT IN ODESSA

Janet Skeslien Charles

Moonlight in Odessa might refer to the light cast by that silvery orb on the waters of the Black Sea, but in this compelling debut novel by Janet Skeslien Charles moonlight takes on worlds of other meanings for its chief character, Daria Kirilenko.
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Reviewed by Tui Menzies

KALPA IMPERIAL

Angélica Gorodischer

Translated from the Spanish by Ursula K. Le Guin

Kalpa Imperial, the first book I have read by the eminent Argentine writer Angélica Gorodischer, is a fantasy—or, as the final story implies, perhaps a science fiction novel—set in an imagined empire with a lengthy history. But if the thought of another cookie-cutter epic fantasy fills you with dread...
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Reviewed by Tim Jones

WENCH

Dolen Perkins-Valdez

To enter the world of Wench is to imagine oneself dying of thirst while surrounded by water, or starving while everyone else eats their fill. Using an unusual setting, Perkins-Valdez's debut novel illustrates the painful temptation that confronts a slave in a world where freedom hangs like forbidden fruit on every tree.
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Reviewed by Kathleen Ambrogi

MORNINGS IN JENIN

Susan Abulhawa

Mornings In Jenin, a first novel by Susan Abulhawa, is the story of one family's experience of exile from their West Bank home, and their subsequent struggles under military occupation and emigration.
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Reviewed by Barbara Steeg