Eurotrash: A Novel [Paperback]

From the great German-language writer of his generation (Joshua Cohen) comes the second novel of Christian Krachts career narrated by an eponymous Christian (the first was his bestselling debut,A probing masterpiece-in-miniature of self-reflection and cultural reckoning. A frolicking rumination on waning parent-child relationships and the struggles of approaching the final chapter of life. Some literary reputations take shape over decades; others, like Christian Krachts arrive fully formed. Kracht has become a much surer writer in the last thirty years. He has more ideas, more voices, a more varied emotional palate at his disposal. The addition of Krachts mother in particular, as an object of observation, interlocutor, and emotional core opens up Reading Christian Krachts This is a provocative take on elite European culture: a large still-life of dust-lined objects, each with its own toxic history, its uses and representations; an invisible gravity measurable in language. Kracht ( Incendiary . . . A playful tale of reconciliation that never becomes saccharine, this is one readers wont want to miss. Whether hes fictionalizing history in order to question the validity of history or fictionalizing himself in order to question the validity of self, it is by now apparent to me and to his many readers that Christian Kracht is the great German-language writer of his generation. Theres a refreshing bright moral clarity to Christian Krachts Christian Kracht began his storied career as Germanic literatures late-capitalist enfant terrible, then somehowstealthily, almost magicallytransformed himself into its conscience. Eurotrash is Thomas Bernhards Extinction with a sense of humor. Christian Kracht is a master of beautifully constructed sentences, the elegance of which conceals dread. His novels are about Germany, about ghosts, about war and delusion and every conceivable horror, but they are also full of melancholy comedy, and they all contain a hidden l3'