English rights of Kalmann by Joachim B. Schmidt sold to Bitter Lemon Press

We have sold English rights of Joachim B. Schmidt’s Kalmann to Bitter Lemon Press – and straight after that Slovak rights to Literárna Bašta. This means that the book is going to be published in six languages:

Arabic (Al-Arabi)
English (Bitter Lemon)
Icelandic (Forlagið)
Slovak (Literárna Bašta)
Spanish (Gatopardo)

Since returning to the Spiegel bestseller list a few weeks ago, Kalmann has now remained on it for four weeks.

More press is coming in:

»A novel that reads like an Icelandic Fargo. Crude, droll, bloody, very funny and with a multitude of surprising twists.«
Peter Zimmermann / Radio Ö1, Vienna

»Kalmann, more Forrest Gump than Miss Marple, takes on the challenge. It's as lively as it is icy.«
Spiegel, Hamburg

Please let us know if you would like to read our English sample translation.

From the Depth of the Lake by Moritz Heger – a Diogenes debut, now published

A Benedictine monastery, idyllically located by a lake. Their guest wing is well-frequented, but most of the monks are approaching biblical age. One of the younger monks has just left the monastery and started a family. Ever since, Lukas, who is in his late 30s, has also begun to question his path in life. Then Sarah appears – mindful, caring and corporeal. Lukas' fellows are urging him to take over the leadership of the monastery, but life is pulling at him, too. In order to make a decision, Lukas surrenders himself to the lake: the act of swimming allows our bodies and minds to open up.

From the Depth of the Lake has just been published. Booksellers are very enthusiastic about this title, here's their first feedback:

»A gentle, marvellous book.«
Uta Birken / Ida v. Behr bookstore, Volksdorf

»A very strong title from Diogenes!«
Christoph Zehnender / Kloster Triefenstein      

»For me, Moritz Heger’s From the Depth of the Lake is like an intricate watercolour painting, accentuated with clear brushstrokes; the prose interwoven with gems.«
Birgitta Gerig-Wildermuth / schreibenundlesen, Aadorf

»This novel itself is like taking a break in a monastery: calm, profound and philosophical. I paused on numerous occasions to ponder my own thoughts on the issues raised by Brother Lukas. «
Dorothea Weiss / Peterknecht bookstore , Erfurt

Please let us know if you would like to see our English sample translation.

Just published: Shadow Dance by Lukas Hartmann

In 1923, on account of his exorbitant lifestyle, the musician and artist Louis Soutter is committed to a Swiss mental institution by his family. Only his famous cousin Le Corbusier stands by him. Soutter's paintings are unsettling and ignored by the art world of his time. Le Corbusier, both disconcerted and fascinated, becomes intertangled with this archaic art and the convoluted life paths that have led Soutter to this point.

In the first instalment of our new Diogenes podcast (in German) for booksellers, editor Martha Schoknecht and her guest, sales rep Cédric Eigner discuss Hartmann’s way of yet again giving life to an obscure historic figure who will put every reader’s way of looking at art and at the world as it is into a new perspective.

»A virtuoso of the historical novel.«
Charles Linsmayer / NZZ am Sonntag, Zurich
 

Allmen and the Erotic Figurines on German national television

Fans of Martin Suter’s bestselling Allmen series will once again have the chance to follow the adventures of popular dandy detective Johann Friedrich von Allmen (Heino Ferch) on their home screens on 27 March. German national broadcaster ARD is airing the fourth instalment of the film series, this time Allmen and the Erotic Figurines, in their prime-time slot. The bestselling crime novel was adapted for TV by UFA fiction. In Allmen and the Erotic Figurines it is, once more, Allmen himself who commits the crime, stealing an invaluable Fabergé egg and setting the plot of blackmail and deceit into motion. Luckily, Allmen’s assistant Carlos (Samuel Finzi) is at his side to assist the detective in all matters – the ones of crime and the ones of the heart. And this time around those come to be quite entangled. 
 

Now published in translation: Charles Lewinsky's The Stutterer in Dutch

Dutch edition by Meridiaan (Amsterdam)

Benedict Wells' Hard Land shoots to #1 of the Spiegel bestseller list, 5 foreign rights sold

Diogenes has just launched Benedict Wells' Hard Land – and the book shot straight to #1 of the Spiegel bestseller list. Hard Land comes complete with its very own website, trailer and playlist. The shortest summary of the book is its first sentence: »This summer I fell in love and my mother died.«

Here is the list of foreign rights sold:
Dutch (Meulenhoff)
French (Slatkine)
Hungarian (Geopen)
Norwegian (Forlaget Press)
Portuguese (ASA)

German public TV ZDF have aired a brief feature on Benedict Wells, on his development, on writing Hard Land and on signing 2’000 copies of it for his absent fans within two days, in order to stay connected to them. And if you are curious to know more about how the author paints a nostalgic picture of everything the 80s represent – music, movies and youth – have a listen into our brand-new Diogenes podcast (in German).

The press is raving:

»That summer when you first fall in love can never be repeated. But this gem of a book somehow captures the sunbeams of youth and makes them shine brightly again.«
Katja Kraft / Münchner Merkur, Munich

»Page by page, the reader grows more and more fond of the characters, sighing with the first-person narrator and wanting to give him a helping hand.«
Stefan Hauck / Börsenblatt, Frankfurt

»A celebration of youth, as portrayed by master narrators Stephen King and Steven Spielberg in such classic style, in which every experience is unadulterated and intense.«
Thomas Andre / Hamburger Abendblatt, Hamburg

»The novels by Benedict Wells have that special sound, the lithe lightness, that never falls into the trivial, but always has depth.«
Kester Schlenz / Stern, Hamburg

»It is a book that moves to tears and makes deeply happy.«
Roana Brogsitter / B5 aktuell, Munich

Please let us know if you would like to see our English sample translation.

Just published: Paul's Garden by Julian and Timon Meyer

Paul has the prettiest garden 
With the juiciest tomatoes
The spiciest chilli, the plumpest grapes
Pumpkins so big you can scarcely believe.

But wait, where are all the radishes today?
Oh, darling Lieschen!
The beds are empty, the trees bare
And Paul’s face as white as a sheet.

Paul is a passionate gardener. Everything is verdant and blooming and aromatic: Tomorrow is harvest day. But when Paul goes into his garden the next day, everything has gone! He wants to find the thief at once, and a major surprise awaits.

Fickle Flames by Ingrid Noll shoots to #14 of the Spiegel bestseller list

She may not be beautiful, but she can cook and lend a hand. That's why Lorina has become a carer to the elderly, and she's hit the jackpot with her appointment at Mrs Alsfelder's Villa - where there's an endless coming and going of attractive massage therapists and affairs occur that are better kept secret. Further excitement is supplied by an imposed poodle and an abandoned baby, which visibly cheer up the old lady in Lorina's care. Much to the disapproval of her great-nephew, who is waiting in the wings for his inheritance.

Fickle Flames has soared to #14 of the Spiegel bestseller list straight after publication.

»We will not tell you how Ingrid Noll's latest novel ends. However, it offers light, yet very fine entertainment.«
Eberhard Reuss / public radio SWR2, Stuttgart

»Still the most original crime writer in the German language. «
Christel Freitag / NDR Kultur, Hamburg
 

The beautiful Mrs Seidenman by Andrzej Szczypiorski, a modern classic that continues to be re-published until today

Warsaw, 1943. Irma Seidenman has been arrested. Her crime? Someone has denounced her as being Jewish. The proof? An engraving spelling her name, etched on a cigarette case.

»The cigarette case, she thought. It’s always some trifle that decides everything. A cigarette case, without which one can live perfectly well, which one wouldn’t even notice not having. The cigarette case. Irma was certain that were it not for that damned little box she would have been let go.« The beautiful Mrs. Seidenman, Andrzej Szczypiorski, translated by Klara Glowczewska

Claudia says: »Szczypiorski packs all the lunacy of the witch hunt into this scene: Irma Seidenman is not arrested because anyone finds fault with her papers nor with her looks. No, she is arrested because someone accuses her, his only proof being a seemingly innocent cigarette case. In witch hunts, totalitarian states, and anywhere scapegoats are needed, anything is sufficient to deliver a death sentence.«

»There are accidental heroes and inadvertent villains, surprising and unexpected switches that lend the book its extraordinary originality.«
Los Angeles Times Book Review

Foreign rights sold:
English: Weidenfeld & Nicolson (new edition)
French: Noir sur Blanc (recent sale)
Italian: Adelphi
Portuguese (Brazil): Estaçao Liberdade
 

Now published in translation: Tomi Ungerer's Just Married in Italian

Italian edition by Edizioni Clichy (Florence)