Novel
In a dusty village in the Great Hungarian Plain, Daru, nearly a teenager, is fighting for his position as gang leader, for his self-respect and his love – in other words, for his life. As Daru makes his way through the maze of emotional trails, past and future, in every relationship he loses something of himself, and dies a little. This way, he comes of age. Although the wounds and scabs multiply, and his heart becomes thick-skinned, he eventually finds love in a mature relationship. How better to tell someone’s life story than through the story of their loves? As we explore Daru’s story, we are reminded of our own bitter-sweet moments and years.
I hate to cut off their wings… But if they have wings, they will fly.
Product details
ISBN 978 963 1431 76 6
2016, hard cover with jacket,
312 pages, 125×197 mm
3490 HUF
Rights sold
Turkish, Alakarga
Russian, KompasGuide
Arabic, Fawasel
Two girls are found dead in a village sometime in the 1960s. The third one is still alive when they find her, but by the time the doctor arrives, the wounded girl has already disappeared. Her boyfriend, a young policeman, stumbles across the truth decades later in Budapest after a strange meeting. From this enigmatic detective story the mosaic of a family novel unfolds.
A haunting family story of desire and loneliness spanning a hundred years. When the protagonist and narrator of the novel is asked by a local newspaper to write an incident article about an old family photograph, this seemingly harmless task entangles him in a web of mysteries and elusive family mythology. Past and present mingle as tribal secrets and mysteries, stories of adultery, jealousy, homosexuality, friendship and betrayal unravel before the eyes of the reader, and the truth is gradually revealed about a long-forgotten – and long-concealed – family history. – Aegon Award 2012, 10 printings, more than 35,000 copies sold.
In July 1919, Sanyi, the vegetarian butcher and devoted member of the communist party, a handsome guy who has a tattoo on his chest that reads ‘Gesamtkunstwerk,’ sets off to Vienna on a secret mission, with a suitcase full of gold. While in Vienna, he learns that the revolution had been crushed, and from then on, his activity will be considered illegal. Thus begins Sanyi’s tragicomical adventure story, full of blood and false identities, all hilariously told by Noémi Szécsi, professedly a descendant of this latter-day Monte Cristo. Eventually, Sanyi is released from prison and starts a new life, in which he tries to conceal his communist past even from his family.
A historical novel about the present, Noémi Szécsi’s new novel explores some life strategies that women tend to employ in our time. The reader has a chance to take a sneak peek into various venues in contemporary Budapest, from ruin pubs to luxury parties of the cultural élite at a home restaurant in downtown Budapest, with some scenes taking place at the location shooting of a historical film series. Portrayed sarcastically yet empathically, the two main characters are professional women, friends and rivals: Elza, a lawyer who has recently returned from England and now works for a publishing house, and Em, a cultural historian who is working as an advisor to the film shoot. They are both witty and neurotic, trying to tough it out in the turbulent Europe of the 2010s. The novel is dominated by the dialogues and inner monologues of these two women, with some minor characters appearing here and there: family members responsible for various traumas; rivals; lovers, past and present; mentors who foul up their mentees’ budding careers; and a heiress who sees ghosts.
Magvető Rights 
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