Book description
In sixty-eight years, Valeria has never minced her words. Harrumphing
through her isolated little village deep in the Hungarian steppes, she
clutches her shopping basket like a battering ram and leaves nothing
uncriticised - flaccid vegetables at the market; idle farmers
carousing in Ibolya's Nonstop Tavern; that gauche chimpanzee of a
mayor and his flashy, leggy wife; people who whistle.
But one day, her spinster's heart is struck by an unlikely arrow: the
village potter, with his decisive hands and solid gaze. Valeria finds
herself suddenly dressing in florals and touching her hair, and what's
more, smiling at people in the street. The potter makes her the most
beautiful vase she has ever seen. The farmers buy a celebratory round.
The problem with all this is that Ibolya (herself at least
fifty-eight) has been romancing the potter for months and vows to win
him back. And then there's Ferenc, the sugar beet farmer, red-headed
and married but all the same hopelessly in love with Ibolya. Meanwhile
the mayor has his own problems, mostly involving foreign investors and
a non-existent railway.
And then a roving chimney sweep arrives in the village, to make a
quick buck and bring some good luck - or perhaps bad luck; no one can
really decide. All anyone knows is, there's never been such a
hullabaloo, which just goes to show it's never too late to try
something new.
Marc Fitten was born in Brooklyn in 1974 and lived in Hungary from
1993 through 1998. He has been published in several American literary
quarterlies and publications, including
Prairie Schooner
and
Esquire
online. He is the editor of the
Chattahoochee Review
and of the
Red Hen Press Literary Translation Series
.
Valeria's Last Stand
is his first novel and will be published in six countries.
Marc Fitten lives in Atlanta
