Den vidunderliga kärlekens historia

The Horrific Sufferings Of the Mind-Reading Monster Hercules Barefoot

ORIGINAL TITLE: Den vidunderliga kärlekens historia

AUTHOR: Carl-Johan Vallgren

ORIGINAL PUBLISHER: Albert Bonniers Förlag

GENRE: Fiction

The Horrific Sufferings of  the Mind-Reading Monster Hercules Barefoot, His Wonderful Love and His Terrible Hatred

Hercules Barefoot was born in 1813 in a brothel in Königsberg.  He is born deaf-mute and hideously deformed, a dwarf, but endowed with a rare gift: He can read people’s minds.

Above all this is the tale of a singular and moving love story. Hercule never forgets Henriette, the girl he grew up with. After they are separated he looks for her all over Europe, never completely giving up hope.

The reader follows his search for Henriette, which takes him to convents and mental hospitals, to the Vatican and to vaudeville theatres, while also offering an insight into the development of a language for deaf people.

Above all this is the tale of a singular and moving love story. Hercule never forgets Henriette, the girl he grew up with. After they are separated he looks for her all over Europe, never completely giving up hope.

Reviews

OPEN

"Dostoevsky’s Prince Myshkin and Jerzy Kosinski’s Chauncy Gardener are Hercules’s literary forebears; he joins them as an unforgettable hero, an unsettling miracle-worker whose path to love is filled with incredible pain. A truly fantastic tale of a heartbreaking saint."

Kirkus Review

"Sensational... Vallgren has a superb talent for pastiche and makes witty and convincing cameos of the infamous and the great"

Financial Times

"A picaresque, grotesque and magical novel."

The Guardian

Rights sold

OPEN

Bulgarian rights sold to Prozoretz.

Chinese (Taiwan) rights sold to Global Group Holdings

Croatian rights sold to Fraktura

Czech rights sold to Dybbuk

Danish rights sold to Borgen

Dutch rights sold toDe Geus

English-US rights sold to Harper Collins US

Finnish rights sold to Tammi

French rights sold to JC Lattès

German rights sold to Insel

Greek rights sold to Psichogios

Italian rights sod to Longanesi

Japanese rights sold to Random House Kodansha

Korean Rights sold to Random House

Latvian Rights sold to Jumava

Lithuanian Rights sold to Alma littera

Norwegian Rights sold to Tiden

Polish Rights sold to Jacek Santorski

Russian Rights sold to Olma-Press

Serbian Rights sold to BeoBook

Spanish Rights sold to Anagrama

Turkish Rights sold to Metis yayinlari

World English rights sold to Harvill Secker