April Fool's Day

A Novel

by Josip Novakovich

On Sale: 03/14/2006

April Fool's Day

A Novel

by Josip Novakovich

On Sale: 03/14/2006

Format:

About the Book

Ivan Dolinar is born in Tito's Yugoslavia on April Fool's Day, 1948 -- the auspicious beginning of a life that will be derailed by backfiring good intentions in a world of propaganda and paranoia. At age nineteen, an innocent prank cuts the young Croatian's budding medical career short and lands him in a notorious labor camp. Released on the eve of civil war, Ivan is drafted into the wrong army, becoming a pawn in an absurd conflict in which the rules and loyalties shift abruptly and without warning. But even in a world gone mad, one course of action remains eminently sane: survival.

Told with bitingly dark humor and a deep tenderness, April Fool's Day is both a devastating political satire and a razor-sharp parody of war.

Critical Praise

“An ambitious first novel ... The magic realism of the final sections is exemplary; Novakovich has found his groove.” — Washington Post

“[Ivan] is a fully rounded character, the type of protagonist...that we rarely find in fiction.” — Chicago Tribune

“Delightfully neurotic . . . Novakovich brings a deft touch to his ambitious and unconventional first novel.” — Columbus Dispatch

“APRIL FOOL’S DAY is a wonder...[It] has an economy of style and narrative that all good readers will relish.” — Republic of Letters

“A heartfelt novel about the war-torn Balkans that’s actually quite funny...and touching.” — GQ

“Both humorous and horrifying as it traces one man’s misadventures.” — USA Today

“Wickedly funny and deeply harrowing...Novakovich knows how to tell a story...Strange, lyrical beauty abounds here.” — Maud Casey, New York Times Book Review

“Disturbing and frequently beautiful...the novel is a Balkan conflation of Louis-Ferdinand Celine, Gogol’s DEAD SOULS, and SLAUGHERHOUSE FIVE.” — Minneapolis Star Tribune

“There are very few native-born English speakers who write as well. — Tibor Fischer, The Guardian

“[A] laugh-while-you-grimace novel...[Novakovich] writes with dark wit, and a touching sympathy.” — Newsweek International

“Rife with dark humor [and] notable for its witty reflections on politics, literature and the vicissitudes of the human heart.” — San Diego Union-Tribune

“An agreeably eccentric first novel from one of the more interesting and unusual contemporary writers.” — Kirkus Reviews, starred

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Resources

Product Details

  • ISBN: 9780060583989
  • ISBN 10: 0060583983
  • Imprint: Harper Perennial
  • On Sale: 03/14/2006
  • Pages: 256
  • List Price:19.99 CAD
  • BISAC1 : FICTION / Historical / World War II
  • BISAC2 : FICTION / World Literature / Europe (General)
  • BISAC3 : FICTION / Historical
  • BISAC4 : FICTION / Contemporary Women
  • BISAC5 : FICTION / Thrillers / Suspense

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