Jacques Thiériot Books

Fascinated by the Hungarian language - he is after all a man who lives by language, ghost writing speeches, advertisements, books - he spends the night watching television, trying to pick out words in this tongue, 'the only one the devil respects'. In charting the life of a Brazilian ghost writer enamoured with the Magyar, Chico Buarque has created his most original fiction yet. The novel coils round the reader like a magical snake from "The Arabian Nights". It is a storytelling labyrinth in Borges or Calvino mode, as Costa's myth-making, love-making and essays into another culture become mired in the world where celebrities make reputations and fortunes from the writing of anonymous others, where the reader is not sure what language, what reality is being offered.

"A community devoured by greed, cowardice and fear. A man persecuted by the ghosts of his painful past. A young woman searching for happiness. In one eventful week, each of them will face questions of life, death and power, and each of them will have to choose their own path. Will they choose good or evil? Coelho dramatizes the struggle with every soul between light and darkness, and its relevance to our everyday struggles: to dare to follow our dreams, to have the courage to be different and to master the fear that prevents us from truly living"--Publisher description.