Short Story Wednesday: "The Late Mistaken" by Dino Buzzati

 

"The Late Mistaken" 

This is one of the stories in The Bewitched Bourgeois by Dino Buzzati, which will be published next month by New York Review Books. Translated by Lawrence Venuti.

In this story, the noted painter Lucio Predonzani, who had retired to his country house in Vimercate, opened the newspaper to discover an announcement of his death. The headline said: "Italian Art World in Mourning; Painter Predonzani is dead."

He tells his wife, then rushes to the city to confront the editor of the paper. The editor is surprised but protests that this could be a good thing for Predonzani. If he pretends to be dead, his paintings will go up in value after his death and he could make money on that. He decides to do exactly that, with the cooperation of the newspaper editor, who would provide publicity for gallery showings of his works. 

The rest of the story is about what happens after that.

This is a very short story about an extremely absurd situation. It is humorous at times. I was intrigued, and would like to try more stories by Buzzati.

Per Wikipedia, Buzzati was an Italian novelist, short story writer, painter and poet who was born in 1906 and died in 1972.

I read this story in the December 2024 issue of Harper's Magazine. It can be read online here; Harper's Magazine allows two free articles a month.

Your Republic is Calling You: Young-Ha Kim

 

The story takes place over the course of one day in the life of Ki-Yong, a South Korean with a wife and teenage daughter. Except that he is really a North Korean spy who has been in Seoul, working as a film importer, over 20 years, and has now been recalled to North Korea. About 10 years into his assignment in South Korea, the man who had run his intelligence group was purged; after that they had heard nothing from anyone in North Korea. For 10 years he has led a normal life but now it has been upended in one email; although Ki-Yong immediately begins following plans for his exit from South Korea, he is fearful and uncertain about his future.

The reader also follows Ki-Yong's wife and daughter throughout the day, and those parts of the story are told from their point of view. The daughter is in high school, doing well in school and with lots of friends, but with typical teen-age angst. His wife is alienated from her husband and unhappy with her life, although we don't understand why until later in the story.

My Thoughts:

• The book is spy fiction, but it is more than that. It is also the picture of a family dealing with problems, and focuses most on how they are affected by the events. We get to know much more about each member of the family as the day unfolds.
• One minor disappointment was that the book is mostly set in South Korea. There are flashbacks to the protagonist's youth in North Korea and they are interesting, as are his reflections on the differences in life in South Korea and North Korea.
• I was immersed in the story, and it whetted my appetite for more reading about North and South Korea.

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Publisher: Mariner Books, 2010 (orig. pub. 2006)
Length:     236 pages
Format:    Trade paperback
Setting:     South Korea, North Korea
Genre:      Espionage fiction
Source:    On my shelves since 2012
Translated from the Korean by Chi-Young Kim

Novellas in November: Three French Novellas

 In November I have read three translated novellas by French authors. All were very good reads. Two of the authors were new to me, Jean-Patrick Manchette and Pascal Garnier. I have read books by Georges Simenon before, but only one in recent years. 

Three to Kill by Jean-Patrick Manchette was a very strange tale. A corporate salesman, Georges Gerfaut, married with two children, is attacked by two hit men on his way home, but they do not succeed in killing him. He suspects that they want to kill him because he saw a car crash on the side of the road and they want to shut him up. He goes into hiding and plots his revenge on the men and their boss. This story, published in 1976, sounds simple but is actually very complex. 

After Gerfaut escapes from the two men, he ends up living with an old man named Ragusa who lives in the woods simply, in a Portuguese logging camp. Ragusa has some medical experience with the military and patches Gerfaut up. Gerfaut stays with him for a few months, building up his strength. When Ragusa dies of a bad cold, Gerfaut leaves to pursue his plan of taking revenge. 

I liked that this story was different and unexpected; I had no clue how it would end. Music and reading is mentioned a lot, which I always find a plus. A lot of plot was covered in its 132 pages.

The Front Seat Passenger by Pascal Garnier was another strange and different story. One night, after returning from a visit with his father, Fabien discovers that his wife has been killed in a car crash. She was the front seat passenger, in a car with a man, who also died in the crash. Fabien and his wife did not have a loving, happy marriage at the time of her death, but Fabien had no idea she was seeing someone else. He becomes obsessed with the wife of the man who died with his wife, and begins stalking her. The plot goes in directions I never expected. 

I cannot say much more about this one without revealing too much of the story. I liked it a lot and will find more by this author, who died in March 2010 at aged sixty. It was about 130 pages and published in 1997. 

Maigret in Retirement by George Simenon was also published as Maigret Gets Angry. Per Goodreads, it was first published in 1947, and was the 26th book out of 75 in the Maigret series. I came upon this story in Maigret's Christmas and it was about 105 pages in that edition, but it has been published separately. I enjoyed this one very much also. 

Two years after Maigret's retirement, a wealthy widow requests that Maigret come to her village to investigate the death of her granddaughter, which has been assumed to be suicide. Reluctantly, Maigret does this and discovers a dysfunctional family, full of people who dislike each other. His investigation reveals deeply buried secrets that the family has been hiding, and a family that seems to be bound together more by greed than love. 

The story is beautifully written, and the depiction of the French countryside is nicely done. And I love Maigret's relationship with his wife.

Three more novellas for the Novellas in November 2021 reading event. The host blogs are 746 Books and Bookish Beck.

Novellas in November: Carte Blanche by Carlo Lucarelli

Carte Blanche is a novella by Carlo Lucarelli, translated from Italian, the first in a trilogy. The setting is April 1945 in Italy. 

The story starts shortly before the end of World War II, in the final days of the Fascist regime in Italy. The protagonist is a policeman in the regular police, Commissario De Luca, who only recently transferred from another police group that worked under the direction of Mussolini. He just wants to solve crimes without having political interference, but that seems impossible in Italy during the war.

De Luca's first assignment in the regular police is to find who is responsible for the murder of a member of the Fascist party, Vittorio Rehinard. This investigation brings him into the world of the rich and privileged. After a day or two of investigation, De Luca begins to understand that no one in a position of power in the police or the government cares whether the killer is caught. He cares, though, and he continues to pursue the investigation.

From the description on the Europa edition that I read:

Carte Blanche, the first installment in Carlo Lucarelli's "De Luca Trilogy," is much more than a first-rate crime story. It is also an investigation into the workings of justice in a state that is crumbling under the weight of profound historic change.

 

My thoughts:

• The Preface by the author is fantastic, explaining his inspiration for writing the story. He followed this story up with two more short novels featuring Comissario De Luca, The Damned Season and Via Delle Oche.
• I nearly always enjoy crime fiction set around the time of World War II, but I have not read many books set in Italy during that time. Thus I learned about new aspects of World War II.
• The story is fast-paced and never boring. The tension is maintained throughout. De Luca is  sometimes perplexed and concerned about his future and the future of the country, but he isn't going to give up on the investigation. 
• At times I was a bit confused about the different factions in Italy, and the many characters and whose side they were on, but that was a minor distraction.

I read this for the "Literature in Translation" Week in the Novellas in November 2021 reading event. The event celebrates the short novel, or novella. The host blogs are 746 Books and Bookish Beck. 

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Publisher:    Europa Editions, 2006 (orig. pub. 1990)
Translator:  Michael Reynolds
Length:       93 pages
Format:      Trade Paperback
Series:        De Luca Trilogy, #1
Setting:       Italy
Genre:        Police Procedural
Source:       Purchased at Planned Parenthood book sale, 2010.

The Awkward Squad: Sophie Hénaff

A police detective, Anne Capestan, has been suspended for six months and expects her superior, Buron, to end her employment. Instead he gives her a new department made up of misfits and rejects from other areas, and provides little in the way of supplies. They don't even have a siren for the car allotted to them. The event that caused Capestan's suspension was related to excessive force on the job, leading to a death; thus she cannot carry a firearm.

This is Sophie Hénaff's first crime fiction novel. Originally published in France in 2015, it was translated to English in 2017. The premise is similar to The Keeper of Lost Causes by Jussi Adler-Olsen (set in Denmark), with a much larger cast. This novel is set in France, and it is more humorous in tone.

Capestan's group is given all the cold cases for the region, and her superiors don't expect them to be solved. Some examples of her new squad are: Lieutenant José Torrez, known as Malchance, whose last few partners have all been injured or died while working with him; Commandant Louis-Baptiste Lebreton, formerly of internal affairs; Capitaine Eva Rosière, author of detective novels which have been developed into a TV show; Capitaine Merlot, an alcoholic; and Lieutenant Évrard, a compulsive gambler. In the boxes of case files that they are allowed to work on they find two unsolved murders.

There are amusing scenes, as the members of the new group learn to work with each other and they set up their new location. The group has not been given real offices, but a spacious apartment in a building where no one will see them. Setting up the apartment, complete with wallpaper and comfortable sofas, is handled with humor. Each person in the group brings unique characteristics even though they have not worked out well in other departments. Sometimes these are comical or disagreeable characteristics but somehow they pull together and use their skills to support the cases they work on.

However, with all the humor, the cases are taken seriously, and most of the detectives assigned to the squad are eager to do well in this job in hopes of getting back to their old jobs. The story is paced well, and there are twists and turns along the way. My husband bought this book and loaned it to me after he read it; we both enjoyed it and plan on reading the second book in the series, Stick Together.

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Publisher:   MacLehose Press, 2018 (orig. pub. 2015)

Translated from the French by Sam Gordon

Length:      260 pages

Format:      Hardcover

Series:       Awkward Squad #1

Setting:     France

Genre:       Police procedural

Source:     Borrowed from my husband.