BBC and other reviews of –

The Club at Eddy's Bar    by  Zoltán BÖSZÖRMÉNYI

"totally compelling – incredibly gripping, page-turning, and a huge plot twist as well. I thoroughly, thoroughly, recommend it." —Janice Forsyth, The Culture Studio, BBC Radio Scotland (30th April 2014)

"Zoltán Böszörményi fled his home country when it was still behind the Iron Curtain. He spent several months in a refugee camp in Austria and draws on this dramatic personal history in The Club at Eddy's Bar… Böszörményi's description of life as a refugee is vivid." —The Sunday Times (Joan Smith's crime roundup, 11 May 2014).

Chosen for Books We Like: May 2014 by Booktrust, London.

"…This is no ordinary murder mystery. It is a well observed and touchingly accurate portrayal of hope and despair which could take place in any city throughout the world." —Booktrust, London. [>click here to read the full Booktrust review<]

“A Hungarian-speaking, Romanian-born Transylvanian …an émigré and a returnee …marinaded in the Cold War.” —Philip Dodd, describing, and in conversation with, Zoltán Böszörményi, on the Free Thinking programme, BBC RADIO 3 (14 May 2014).

“A fabulous book.” —Dr Éimear O’Connor, on the RTÉ Radio Arts programme Arena, Ireland (2 May 2014).

“…Zoltán Böszörményi – one of the most colourful Hungarian authors…” —World of Books, Monocle Radio, London (30 April 2014)

"…depicts the universal condition … and the story ends with a dramatic and surprising conclusion."—Tisza literary magazine, Hungary.

"Damn this was good! … engaging until the last page." —LibraryThing Early Reviewer, Essex.

"…kept on reading into the early hours … and will definitely be recommending it to my friends." —LibraryThing Early Reviewer, Surrey.

"…a gripping thriller which skilfully combines three narrative strands…" —LibraryThing Early Reviewer, Malta.

"…I spent many late nights reading it, unable to stop turning pages." —LibraryThing Early Reviewer, Florida.

"…I really liked this structure of getting a lot of glimpses into human nature. The characters' motivations (except for Tamas) often were impossible to comprehend, but on the other hand they were deeply human, as contradictory as people truly are." —LibraryThing Early Reviewer, Germany.

"…a beautiful read with lovely use of the English language. I had to make extra hours in the day, as I couldn't put the book down and will be heartily recommending it to friends and family." —LibraryThing Early Reviewer, West Sussex.

"The language was beautiful and once I'd finished the book I felt really satisfied with it." —LibraryThing Early Reviewer, Sweden.

"Passion takes over safe, middle-class lives – the characters do not commit the acts of ambition, sex, murder, and pleasure that follow as much as live through them as hapless victims." —Irodalmi Jelen Literature Review, Budapest.

 

A Murder Story like no other, by a prize-winning author.

See the Book Trailer Video, with Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2 (below ↓)

In the last years of the Cold War, the Club at Eddy's Bar is a magnet for the élite of a city in the Carpathian Mountains. They keep one another's secrets, even the truth about a brutal murder. When a young journalist learns too much, he has to flee the country.
Forced to leave behind his wife and children, he is admitted to Canada as a refugee. He brings with him the notebook in which he has kept his account of the crime, hoping to publish it when his family is safely with him. But as he struggles to start a new life in Canada, he finds as many secrets and lies are being concealed by those with power and money in the new country as in the old.
The Club at Eddy's Bar is both a gripping murder mystery and an intricate and involving tale of power, hypocrisy, love, and betrayal.

In 2009, the author received the Gundel Arts Award for the Hungarian version of The Club at Eddy's Bar, and in 2012 the József Attila Award for Hungarian literature.

With Cover images from drawings by the Hungarian artist (of Irish ancestry) Ferenc MARTYN —front cover: 'Kávéházban' (1927); back cover: detail from 'Párizsi létkép'. [• click here for more information about this artist]

[• click here (or on the cover image above) to preview Sample Pages of this book on PDF ]

In Hardback, 440 pages:
ISBN: 978-1-908420-077, r.r.p.: £19.99 / €24.99

Also in an ePub (& Kindle-format) eBook:
ISBN(eBook): 978-1-908420-084
r.r.p. £8.30 (excl.VAT) / €9.99 (excl.VAT) /$11.99

• This novel was presented at a reception in the Hungarian Cultural Centre [Balassi Institute] in Covent Garden, London, in April 2014 • click here for details:  

The author, Zoltán Böszörményi, was born in 1951 in the Hungarian community of Arad in Transylvania, and studied for seven years at the Ballet School in Cluj. He began his writing career in the Iron Curtain days of Eastern Europe, publishing in Transylvania two books of Hungarian-language poetry, the second of which (considered politically unacceptable) resulted in his arrest and interrogation by Romanian security officers. He fled to the West, through Yugoslavia, spent seven months at Traiskirchen Refugee Camp in Austria, then was admitted to Canada, where he learned English and graduated from York University in Toronto.
After returning to Eastern Europe in the 1990s, he became a successful industrialist, setting up Romania's most modern lighting company.
He retired from industry to return to writing, and is editor-in-chief of a Hungarian-language daily and monthly journal based in Arad and Budapest. He is married, and has two daughters.

Exceptional Books and Exceptional Authors !