Karen Duve — Rain

Bloomsbury (UK) 2004 Paperback, 256pp. An international bestseller already translated into nine languages, Karen Duve's disturbing and hilarious debut is not for the squeamish-or anyone with snail phobia. When Leon Ulbricht lands a contract to write a gangster's memoirs and moves into his dream home in a small East German village with his beautiful wife Martina, everything seems set for an idyllic existence. But the dream home turns out to be in the middle of a fetid marsh, his house and his marriage are falling apart, he can't write the book he needs to write, and before he knows it, he's spent the last penny of his advance. On top of all this, it rains without end, and Leon and Martina's attempts to repair the house, or at least dry it out, are hampered by the plague of slugs eating away at the garden and the foundations. And just when it looks as though things couldn't possibly get any worse, the gangster, wondering why his memoirs still have not been completed, decides to get nasty. (ISBN: 9780747570967). Very Good.