Kree
A Post-Exotic Novel
Published on 22. October 2024
Book
Paperback/Softback
280 pages
978-1-5179-1512-4 (ISBN)
Description
A warrior struggles through an apocalyptic landscape and the world after death
Kree has been raised as a fearless fighter in a ravaged world: postapocalyptic, posthuman, the population decimated by wars and civilization long since collapsed. After her attempt to avenge the death of her dog, Loka, goes horribly wrong, Kree finds herself lost in a world after death and wanders into the city of the terrible mendicants.
Under the Brothers' totalitarian rule, Kree can lead a quiet life and forget her violent past, even if needles grow in her skull and hallucinatory blood rains occasionally pour down to remind her. She can make friends: a healer with a shaking tent, a mysterious stranger hatched from an egg, and a gruff electrician in a world without electricity. And she can have her Loka as long as she toes the Party line and does as she's told. When she can't-when her friends start to disappear and the Brothers turn against her-Kree sets out on a quest, searching for a new way forward.
Multiply reincarnated and unstuck in time, Kree is the characteristically marvelous creation of Manuela Draeger, whose extraordinary stories, in the words of author China MiEville, "are as close to dreams as fiction can be."
Kree has been raised as a fearless fighter in a ravaged world: postapocalyptic, posthuman, the population decimated by wars and civilization long since collapsed. After her attempt to avenge the death of her dog, Loka, goes horribly wrong, Kree finds herself lost in a world after death and wanders into the city of the terrible mendicants.
Under the Brothers' totalitarian rule, Kree can lead a quiet life and forget her violent past, even if needles grow in her skull and hallucinatory blood rains occasionally pour down to remind her. She can make friends: a healer with a shaking tent, a mysterious stranger hatched from an egg, and a gruff electrician in a world without electricity. And she can have her Loka as long as she toes the Party line and does as she's told. When she can't-when her friends start to disappear and the Brothers turn against her-Kree sets out on a quest, searching for a new way forward.
Multiply reincarnated and unstuck in time, Kree is the characteristically marvelous creation of Manuela Draeger, whose extraordinary stories, in the words of author China MiEville, "are as close to dreams as fiction can be."
Reviews / Votes
"A written nightmare at once alarming and beautiful. Kree deftly muddles the distinction between life and dream and death in a way that is profound, unsettling, and nevertheless deeply human."-Brian Evenson, author of Good Night, Sleep Tight and translator of Manuela Draeger's In the Time of the Blue Ball"Bizarre imagery melds with the stark realities of oppression to create a harrowing, inescapable atmosphere. [...] Kree is a dark, mind-bending novel about what humanity is left with once they have nothing to remember or to fight for."-Foreword Reviews
"The setup and [the book's] execution are beyond compelling, but the multifaceted Kree [titular character] digs much deeper, tunneling into the dark matter of violence, bodily autonomy, and the afterlife."-Book Riot
"A midapocalyptic story set in a succession of afterlives, rife with intense bodily detail and hallucinatory visions and ideas, Kree is a bizarre but entrancing meditation on endings and returns."-Locus Magazine
"The poetic quality is enough for me to say to give [Kree] a try."-Newcity Lit
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Minnesota
United States
Dimensions
Height: 213 mm
Width: 137 mm
Thickness: 21 mm
Weight
322 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-5179-1512-4 (9781517915124)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Persons
Manuela Draeger is a member of the imaginary collective of post-exotic writers, along with Antoine Volodine, Lutz Bassmann, and Elli Kronauer, who have produced more than forty works so far in French. She works as a containment camp librarian and has written numerous books for children as well as for an adult audience. Works that have appeared in English include In the Time of the Blue Ball, translated by novelist Brian Evenson, and Eleven Sooty Dreams, translated by J. T. Mahany.
Lia Swope Mitchell has a PhD in French from the University of Minnesota. Her translations include Solo Viola by Antoine Volodine and Survival of the Fireflies by Georges Didi-Huberman, both published by the University of Minnesota Press. Her original fiction has appeared in Asimov's, Apex, Terraform, and elsewhere. She lives in Minneapolis.
Lia Swope Mitchell has a PhD in French from the University of Minnesota. Her translations include Solo Viola by Antoine Volodine and Survival of the Fireflies by Georges Didi-Huberman, both published by the University of Minnesota Press. Her original fiction has appeared in Asimov's, Apex, Terraform, and elsewhere. She lives in Minneapolis.