Our poor cats doing their best to survive another heat wave that struck Belgrade. Today it’s +42 C (+108 F) . . .
Author Archives: zzivkovic
Slovenian Editions of Miss Tamara, The Reader and The Library
Here are the covers to two new Slovenian editions of my books just out from publisher Blodnjak: Miss Tamara, The Reader and The Library respectively:
Foreign Edition Book Covers
Below are all 32 foreign edition covers of my books published so far, split into two large JPG files. Click on each file to enlarge.
Two Reviews of Seven Touches of Music
In Issue 6 (Summer 2007) of The Pacific Rim Review of Books, Bernard Gastel reviews Seven Touches of Music:
The central conceit seems to be that God is a violinist, a composer whose composition is suggestive of the entire world in its historical and future complexity. Characters are given glimpses of alternate or apparently lost parts of that composition, but, just as music described is no longer music, they do not have the means to share that glimpse with anyone else. Their impossible experiences would be considered signs of instability and nothing more. In the first story a teacher of autistic children finds that instead of filling a sheet of paper with nothing but the letter ‘O’ as he normally does, one of his students – apparently under the influence of music – writes a series of numbers. This series, it turns out, is a physical constant, one of the “fundamental values of nature.” There is nothing the teacher can do with this information, because there is no recurrance of this anomaly. All the characters in the book are confronted with a moment of divine clarity, and their choice, when possible, is invariably to return to the comfort or banality of everyday things.
In Seven Touches of Music ultimate truths have an ambiguous existence. It is exactly where those truths are revealed that loss is felt most profoundly. A short, beautiful book, it shows a world where the ideal, where it exists at all, is found in the world’s shadows as well as in its light.
And a very nice reader review on the Amazon.co.uk page for the book, by Mr. RB Fortune-Wood “Rowan”:
Nietzsche once claimed “Without music, life would be an error.” The nihilistic Romanian thinker Emil Cioran, heavily influenced by Nietzsche, said on God, “without Bach, God would be a complete second rate figure.” I cannot think of anything better than these two aphorisms to convey the impression the Serbian writer Zoran Zivkovic’s Seven Touches of Music made on me. Each narrative compliments the others forming a beautiful mosaic novel fittingly contained in an exquisite black cover. Seven Touches of Music is reminiscent of H.P. Lovecraft’s short story “The Music of Erich Zann,” which possesses a similar inexplicable pull.
The Last Book in Korean
The South Korean language trade edition rights for my metafictional thriller The Last Book have been sold to the Seoul-based publisher ‘Eyes and Heart Press,’ for publication in 2009, through the Korea Copyright Center Inc.
Rights to The Last Book have already been sold in the UK, Germany and Croatia. In late 2008/early 2009, a seven-episode TV series based on the novel will be produced by the Serbian National Television (RTS).
Steps Through the Mist Wins Gold Award for Production
The Detroit Club of Printing House Craftsmen recently awarded its 2008 Gold Award to McNaughton & Gunn, the truly excellent US printing company that produces all of Aio Publishing’s books. The award was given “for superb craftsmanship in the production of Steps Through the Mist by Zoran Zivkovic,” which has been added to its Gallery of Superb Printing.
My other Aio-produced book, Seven Touches of Music, previously took top honors for design at the 55th Annual Chicago Book Clinic Book and Media Show.
It is wonderful to see that the time, effort, and artistry taken to produce such beautiful editions of my books are being recognized and awarded. My congratulations to McNaughton & Gunn!
Blogcritics Magazine on Steps and Seven Touches
Richard Marcus at Blogcritics Magazine has posted some insightful reviews of my two books from Aio Publishing.
Like all of Zivkovic’s stories, Steps Through The Mist will leave you scratching your head about the nature of dreams, and what effect we may or may not have on our fates. Does it really matter whether we make a concentrated effort to change our futures, or will what comes about comes about no matter what? Reality is not as far removed from the world of our dreams as we like to think, and the future is always waiting for us no matter what we do.
For a novel like Seven Touches Of Music to work we have to believe in the characters and their circumstances sufficiently that the impact the music has on their lives becomes as significant to us as it does to them. Zivkovic has not only made his characters utterly convincing, but his depiction of their lives, and the environment they live in, are detailed in such a manner that we can feel the shock to their systems when they are given their brief glimpses into the unknown.
Escher’s Loops Reading in Budva
For my Serbian and Montenegrin readers:
I will be giving a literary reading next month to celebrate the release of my new novel Escher’s Loops (this is the Geopoetika edition; the PS Publishing edition will be out in 2009). The reading will take place on 12 July 2008, at Poets’ Square in the ancient Montenegrin city of Budva, the same city where last year I was presented with the Stefan Mitrov Ljubisa Award for lifetime achievement in literature.
If you have a Facebook account, please do visit the event page for the reading, and be so kind as to RSVP. Also, feel free to spread the news!
The Library and Miss Tamara Acquired by Blodnjak
The Ljubljana-based publisher Blodnjak has acquired the Slovenian-language rights for two more of my books: The Library and Miss Tamara, The Reader. Blodnjak previously published my novels The Fourth Circle in 2006 and The Bridge in 2008, and has announced that they will continue bringing out my books to a Slovenian audience.
Publication of The Library and Miss Tamara, The Reader is expected in 2008/2009.
The Barking Dog on Impossible Stories
Lawrence Conquest recently reviewed my mega-collection Impossible Stories (PS Publishing, 2006) for The Barking Dog:
Zivkovic’s stories generally focus on the intrusion of the bizarre or fantastic into otherwise normal lives, often with characters facing moral dilemmas, with the results often reading like bizarre modern fairy tales or fables. Dreamlike, occasionally nightmarish, and loaded with symbolism, Zivkovic’s characters find themselves sliding through time, encountering God, the Devil, and even the author himself in several post-modern moments.