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  • Published: 27 June 2011
  • ISBN: 9780141968810
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 352

The Free World




The much anticipated debut novel from New Yorker '20 Under 40' writer David Bezmozgis, previously shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award

Welcome to Rome. It is the summer of 1978, and the Krasnansky family, bickering, tired and confused, are supposed to be passing through. Alongside thousands of other Soviet Jewish refugees - among them criminals, dissidents and refuseniks - they await passage to their new homes in the West. But escaping Communism is not so easy, especially when some of the Krasnanskys insist on bringing it with them, and even more so when their sponsor in the USA lets them down and they find that they're no longer passing through at all. On the contrary, they're stuck.
Welcome, then, to the waiting room of your life, and to a tragic yet comic tale of reckless brothers and long-suffering sisters, ailing parents and innocent children, of love affairs and criminal liaisons, of a wonderfully troubled family and a perpetually wandering people, and their epic search for a home: somewhere, anywhere - or Canada, as it turns out.

  • Published: 27 June 2011
  • ISBN: 9780141968810
  • Imprint: Penguin eBooks
  • Format: EBook
  • Pages: 352

About the author

David Bezmozgis

Date: 2004-10-21
David Bezmozgis was born in Riga, Latvia, in 1973. In 1980 he emigrated with his parents to Toronto, where he lives today. His critically acclaimed short story collection, Natasha and Other Stories, was published in 2004.

Date: 2004-10-21
David Bezmozgis was born in Riga, Latvia, in 1973. In 1980 he emigrated with his parents to Toronto, where he lives today.

Also by David Bezmozgis

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Praise for The Free World

A major new talent ... superb

Independent

Quietly astonishing fables of unmistakeable brilliance ... Breathtaking

Observer on Natasha and other Stories

With a maturity and control far beyond his years, Mr Bezmozgis has produced a captivating and impressive debut. The title story itself is one I will never forget

Jeffrey Eugenides

Passionately full of life ... his literary skills [are] remarkable

James Wood, London Review of Books

Scary good ... Not a line or note in the book rings false

Esquire