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Reconnaisance
Nadejda is backpacking around New Zealand in the surreal haze of summer. Her encounters are comic and revealing - and often sexual. But Nadejda's tour is a deep and personal one; it is a journey into memory and family myth.
306 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1999
52 people want to read
About the author
Kapka Kassabova
34 books393 followersKapka Kassabova was born and raised in Sofia, Bulgaria in the 1970s and 1980s. Her family emigrated to New Zealand just after the fall of the Berlin Wall, and she spent her late teens and twenties in New Zealand where she studied French Literature, and published two poetry collections and the Commonwealth-Writers Prize-winner for debut fiction in Asia-Pacific, Reconnaissance.
In 2004, Kapka moved to Scotland and published Street Without a Name (Portobello, 2008). It is a story of the last Communist childhood and a journey across post-communist Bulgaria. It was short-listed for the Dolman Travel Book Award.
The music memoir Twelve Minutes of Love (Portobello 2011), a tale of Argentine tango, obsession and the search for home, was short-listed for the Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust Book Awards.
Villa Pacifica (Alma Books 2011), a novel with an equatorial setting, came out at the same time.
Border: a journey to the edge of Europe (2017 Granta/ Greywolf) is an exploration of Europe's remotest border region.
Her essays and articles have appeared in The Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement, Vogue, The Sunday Times, The Scottish Review of Books, The NZ Listener, The New Statesman, and 1843 Magazine.
In 2004, Kapka moved to Scotland and published Street Without a Name (Portobello, 2008). It is a story of the last Communist childhood and a journey across post-communist Bulgaria. It was short-listed for the Dolman Travel Book Award.
The music memoir Twelve Minutes of Love (Portobello 2011), a tale of Argentine tango, obsession and the search for home, was short-listed for the Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust Book Awards.
Villa Pacifica (Alma Books 2011), a novel with an equatorial setting, came out at the same time.
Border: a journey to the edge of Europe (2017 Granta/ Greywolf) is an exploration of Europe's remotest border region.
Her essays and articles have appeared in The Guardian, The Times Literary Supplement, Vogue, The Sunday Times, The Scottish Review of Books, The NZ Listener, The New Statesman, and 1843 Magazine.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
April 4, 2013
At first I found the author's attempts to integrate Bulgarian idioms into the English text heavy-handed, and the dour mood overpowering. I found it hard to ant to return to reading after I put the book down in the first few chapters, because of its intense negativity. But it grew on me as it went... the heart-tugging references to cultural phenomena, like plastic square bags of flavored milk, became more seamlessly integrated as the novel progressed and the characters more and more relatable.
Displaying 1 of 1 review