The Attempt

Reviews / Votes

World Literature Today "Notable Translations of the Year" selection Words Without Borders "Women in Translation to Read Now" selection Literary Hub "Translated Books by Women You Should Read" selection Czech Book Award Finalist "Masterful... In the tradition of Prus, Kundera, and Vonnegut ... [Platzova's] writing style is varied, sparing, insightful, and at times nothing short of poetic. Enthusiastically recommended." --Historical Novels Review "Platzova's ultra-restrained curation of her material, translated with equal restraint and discrimination by Alex Zucker ... is a powerfully distilled meditation on the meaning of freedom, a ferocious complexity lurking beneath its smooth and hypnotically readable surface." --Words Without Borders "A lively story... Platzova demonstrates an understanding of anarchy and has a remarkable ability to explain it without dumbing it down." --World Literature Today "A tale to please all readers, from lovers of literary fiction to history buffs to social activists." --Literary Hub "A vivid reconstruction of the life of Andrei B. and Louise G., their deportation, radicalization, and enduring love. Between this and 2014's Aaron's Leap, Platzova is on a roll, telling rich stories of European history and the 20th century's cumbrous fallout." --Publishers Weekly "Encompasses history, anarchy, and love ... bridg[ing] a century of social foment." --Kirkus Reviews "The Attempt is historical fiction at its best. Through its narrator's archival approach to his material, the book explores the intimate lives of a pair of fervent idealists, as well as a robber baron and his family. The result is a vivid, poignant narrative about political upheaval, both in the past and the present." --SIRI HUSTVEDT, author of The Blazing World "In her resonant and lucid tale, elegantly translated by Alex Zucker, Platzova weaves together the story of her hero's search and an imaginary reconstruction of the passionate history that haunts him, and suggests the enduring power of ideals even after they have been shattered." --CALEB CRAIN, author of Necessary Errors "Magdalena Platzova's lively prose keeps readers on tenterhooks while tracing the troubled history of an industrialist's family and fortune and the rise and fall of anarchism." --EDITH KURZWEIL, former editor of Partisan Review and author of Full Circle: A Memoir "[A] carefully crafted story, written in a lucid and refined language... The Attempt examines the perennial questions of social order, sacrifice and self-sacrifice, freedom, and acceptability of violence as the conditions for change. These questions catch us by surprise in our post-utopian times, especially when an East European author of Platzova's generation raises them. But [she] succeeds in her attempt to bring these questions to life and show their relevance; she does it without ideology and with urgency, which make the novel a pleasure to read." --VERONIKA TUCKEROVA, Preceptor in Slavic Languages and Literatures, Harvard University