Crossing

Reviews / Votes

A strikingly modern narrative where oppression is not just political but lived in the body * Guardian, Best New Translated Fiction * Reading Pajtim Statovci's fiction is like entering a lucid dream: life and death intertwines in an intimate dance; the nostalgia for the past is akin to the nostalgia for the future. Crossing is a novel that dazzles and mesmerizes, and the reader, upon finishing, may have the extraordinary sensation that his or her own dreams have been scattered along the journey, beckoning for rereading -- Yiyun Li Crossing will devour you; this is some fierce, dazzling, and heartbreaking shit -- NoViolet Bulawayo Anyone who has ever known what it's like to leave home in pursuit of happiness and belonging will most likely love this tender, beautiful novel as much as I did -- Imbolo Mbue Everything, and I mean everything, is threatened with devastation and loss, but Pajtim Statovci's prose, the quality of his seeing and remembering, promises to save an invaluable part for all of us -- Amitava Kumar A beautifully tragic and contemporary story, told without concessions. It resonates somehow with any of us who is fighting the double battle of exile and sexual identity. I found it very sincere in its raw, brutal end, where his destiny seems to return to the starting point, home, with a heavy load of life guilt and sorrow, he will remain an exile one way or the other -- Djavadi Negar Stunning... The brutal beauty of Crossing comes from its almost cellular understanding of belonging and exclusion, love and cruelty. It is a powerful phoenix of a book that rises from the ashes of the previous century -- Kapka Kassabova * Guardian * Statovci's prose is slyly artful -- Anthony Cummins * Observer * The brutal beauty of Crossing comes from its almost cellular understanding of belonging and exclusion, love and cruelty. It is a powerful phoenix of a book that rises from the ashes of the previous century. It speaks to the sins of the fathers, which the children must transcend by crossing to the other side - or perish * Guardian * Crossing is full of insights and thought-provoking reflection -- Sarah Gilmartin * The Irish Times * Profoundly unsettling but beautifully written and translated... just read it, ok? You'll feel better for having done so * Ox * Mesmerising... beautiful, haunting and brilliant * Attitude Magazine * Statovci's prose is mesmerising * The Tablet * ... sad and searching ... Statovci uses no magic-realist elements here, and with its stark language, unanswered questions, and unrelenting heartbreak, this may be the more poignant of his powerful novels * Booklist * Crossing arrives at a moment when many of us have grown suspicious of monolithic categories -- gay, straight, Finnish, Albanian, man, woman -- and have begun to recognize how inadequate such labels are to encompass the reality of individual lives. The novel memorably portrays the pain those labels can cause; it also suggests that we may not be able to live without them. -- Garth Greenwell * New Yorker * Statovci interweaves traditional folklore and myth into what is a deeply modern story, which criss-crosses countries and cultures, from Albania and Rome to New York * The Calvert Journal * The writing itself is so gorgeous that it's easy to follow Statovci down uncertain paths * The Red Hook Star-Revue * Raw and lyrical... Crossing finds a genuinely touching way to emphasise the urgency of opening up the questions we so often force closed * Asymptote Journal * Immerses readers in contemporary issues of nationalism, borders, identity and shame... * Traveller Magazine * Beguiling... A centrifugal story told with great sensitivity and empathy, highlighting Statovci's development as a leading voice in modern European literature * Kirkus Reviews * Mesmerising... beautiful, haunting and brilliant * Attitude Magazine * - * Praise for 'My Cat Yugoslavia' * Widely praised, very good passages... an extraordinary achievement * Sunday Times * Statovci's literary gifts are prodigious. * The New York Times Book Review * Fearless, delicate, beautiful, sad, haunting, and wonderful. A brilliant novel that mesmerizes with both its humanity and its utter uniqueness. A novel you'll be thinking about long after you've turned the last page * Jeff VanderMeer * An elegant, allegorical portrait of lives lived at the margin, minorities within minorities in a new land... [My Cat Yugoslavia] is a fine debut, layered with meaning and shades of sorrow * Kirkus Reviews (starred review) * A strange, haunting, and utterly original exploration of displacement and desire... a marvel, a remarkable achievement, and a world apart from anything you are likely to read this year -- Tea Obreht * The New York Times Book Review * This beautiful debut is about a great many things... Pajtim Statovci is a writer of brilliant originality and power, and his debut novel conveys as few books can what life feels like now * Garth Greenwell, author of 'What Belongs to You' *