Description
This Czech-language novel, inspired by real events, is a gripping family saga spanning the period from the Second World War to the present day. Its evocative story of identity, guilt and punishment, revenge and forgiveness leads from the hell of concentration camps and bombed German cities to communist gulags, the rugged, sombre landscape of Jeseníky and the luxurious world of the international jet set. It explores the minds of criminals and their victims, as well as the unquenchable desire for life, justice and redemption. When does revenge become forgiveness, and is living with punishment worse than death? Does a potential murderer slumber within each of us, and what are the consequences when post-totalitarian oligarchy becomes linked with an “independent” judiciary? The story also includes actress Kim Novak, the star of Hitchcock’s Vertigo, renowned writer Graham Greene and Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal. This existential drama with elements of a mystical thriller defies simple classification and genre clichés through its distinctive narrative style. Ivan Fíla creates a modern European novel and a bitter testimony to a past that continues to shape the present.