New Releases by Ken Kalfus

A Lit Hub Most Anticipated Book of 2025 A Kirkus Starred Review “A cunning writer with masterful timing and an outrageous sense of humor.”—Gary Shteyngart An irreverent, darkly comic novel dissecting the misjudgments, hypocrisies, and occasional good motives that drive our politics and our journalism, as well as our most intimate personal relations. At his desk one day, prominent Washington commentator Adam Zweig receives a text message. “Btw want to give you a heads-up abt some breaking news,” it reads. “Call soonest.” These are the early rumblings of an eventual media storm generated by small-town reporter Valerie Iovine, who has gone public with her account of sexual harassment at the hands of esteemed editor and liberal icon Max Lieberthol. Twenty years have passed since the incident, and though Adam wasn’t directly involved, he quickly finds himself implicated and entangled, his career under imminent threat. Adam has never forgotten his history with Valerie: as former colleagues, their workplace collaboration had gradually tipped into a mutual romantic attraction. Or so he believed. Confronted by the claims against his former boss and a growing awareness of rampant sexism in his industry, Adam, who had always thought of himself as progressive, is forced to challenge his own assumptions over the years. What once seemed incidental becomes sinister; what once seemed like a blundering encounter helped derail a young woman’s promising career. Sly and ironic, A Hole in the Story explores one imperfect man’s dilemmas as he tries to keep his feet in a shifting moral landscape.

"A prescient, high-stakes novel dissecting the ways we tell stories-privately and publicly-amid radical social change"--

As Americans flee widespread civil conflict, one young refugee ekes out a living in a suspenseful, darkly comic novel: “An important writer in every sense.” —David Foster Wallace An Esquire “Best Book of Spring 2022” A Literary Hub “Most Anticipated Book of 2022” A San Francisco Chronicle “Most Anticipated Novel of 2022” In the future, sweeping civil disorder has forced America’s young people to flee its borders into an unwelcoming world. One such American is Ron Patterson, who finds himself on distant shores, working as a repairman and sharing a room with other refugees. In an unnamed city wedged between ocean and lush mountainous forest, Ron can almost imagine a stable life for himself. Especially when he makes the first friend he’s had in years—a mysterious migrant named Marlise, who bears a striking resemblance to a onetime classmate. Nearly a decade later—after anti-migrant sentiment has put their whirlwind intimacy and asylum to an end—Ron is living in “Little America,” an enclave of migrants in one of the few countries still willing to accept them. Here, among reminders of his past life, he again begins to feel that he may have found a home. He adopts a stray dog, observes his neighbors, and lands a new repairman job that allows him to move through the city quietly. But this newfound security, too, is quickly jeopardized, as resurgent political divisions threaten the fabric of Little America. Tapped as an informant against the rise of militant gangs and contending with the appearance of a strangely familiar woman, Ron is suddenly on dangerous and uncertain ground. Brimming with mystery, suspense, and Ken Kalfus’s distinctive comic irony, 2 A.M. in Little America poses questions vital to the current moment: What happens when privilege is reversed? Who is watching and why? How do tribalized politics disrupt our ability to distinguish what is true and what is not? This is a story for our time—gripping, unsettling, prescient—by an acclaimed National Book Award finalist. “My favorite book by one of America’s great living writers.” —Jonathan Safran Foer “A provocative dystopian story . . . takes hold of the reader.” —Publishers Weekly “A highly readable, taut novel.” —The New York Times Book Review “One of contemporary literature’s best-kept secrets.” —Esquire

From National Book Award finalist Ken Kalfus, fifteen adventurous new intellectual comedies, featuring a title novella ripped from the headlines.

Obsessed by a belief that highly evolved beings exist on Mars, a turn-of-the-century British astronomer gets support for a massive project to build a signal that is undermined by malaria-stricken Egyptian laborers and two women who understand the astronomer more than he realizes. By the National Book Award finalist author of A Disorder Peculiar to the Country. 25,000 first printing.

The acclaimed short story and novella collection by “a virtuoso of the dismal comedy of Soviet life”—and the basis for the HBO film PU-239 (The New York Times). Ken Kalfus traverses a century of Russian history in tales that range from hair-raising to comic to fabulous. The astonishing title story follows a doomed nuclear power plant worker as he attempts to hawk plutonium in Moscow’s black market. In “Budyonnovsk,” a young man hopes that the takeover of his town by Chechen rebels will somehow save his marriage. Set in the 1920s, “Birobidzhan” is the bittersweet story of a Jewish couple journeying to the Soviet Far East, where they intend to establish the modern world’s first Jewish state. The novella, “Peredelkino,” which closes the book, traces the fortunes of a 1960s literary apparatchik whose romantic intrigues inadvertently become political. In these and other stories, Kalfus captures the famously enigmatic Russian psyche. A PEN/Faulkner Award Finalist

En 1910, en el remoto apeadero del pueblecito ruso de Astapovo, una variopinta multitud se congrega para asistir a los últimos días de un octogenario y enfermo Tolstói, que ha ido a parar ahí huyendo de su esposa, de su vida contradictoria y quizá de sí mismo. Entre la muchedumbre de acólitos, pícaros y periodistas que conforman ese proto-circo mediático, tres hombres cruzan sus caminos: Nikolai Gribshin, un joven camarógrafo ruso de la productora francesa Pathé; Vorobev, un científico que ha inventado un método para embalsamar cadáveres de modo que parezcan pasmosamente vivos; y Stalin, el futuro líder bolchevique. Los tres están embarcados en proyectos o sueños que iluminarán el recién nacido siglo XX: la capacidad del cine –todavía en sus albores– para reflejar la realidad, la necesidad de preservar la apariencia de vida y la de crear un nuevo hombre revolucionario. Años más tarde, en una Rusia anegada en el baño de sangre de la guerra civil, los tres volverán a encontrarse, y el inicial entusiasmo por el futuro revelará sus claroscuros más tenebrosos.

This acclaimed short story collection “veers between whimsical postmodern playfulness and a darker realism [with] sophisticated comic flare” (Publishers Weekly). Distinguished by black comedy and an international perspective, Ken Kalfus’ stories demonstrate the author’s chameleon-like ability to change mode, manner, and voice. They often concern the abrupt dislocation of people bumping into different cultures, be they real, hallucinated, dreamed, or desired. Kalfus’ characters — which include an endless line of refugees fleeing Sarajevo with no particular destination; an Irish au pair plagued by her own psychosexual fears in a Paris science museum; and an entirely fictitious baseball league — are constantly thumping their heads against a shifting reality. These sympathetic portraits of human beings caught in the tectonic cultural shifts that disrupt our lives are frequently hilarious, consistently touching, and powerfully creative. “A book for people who piss and moan about the unpromising future of American fiction.” —David Foster Wallace

A National Book Award Finalist "The best novel yet about 9/11.... A brilliant new comedy of manners, A Disorder Peculiar to the Country is about the way a conflict takes on a logic and momentum of its own." —Salon “Savagely hilarious.” —Elle Joyce and Marshall each think the other is killed on September 11—and must swallow their disappointment when the other arrives home. As their bitter divorce is further complicated by anthrax scares, suicide bombs, and foreign wars, they suffer, in ways unexpectedly personal and increasingly ludicrous, the many strange ravages of our time. In this astonishing black comedy, Kalfus suggests how our nation’s public calamities have encroached upon our most private illusions.

11 septembre 2001. Dans un grand fracas de fer et de sang, deux tours jumelles, jadis attachées par des liens que certains disent sacrés, s''effondrent à jamais. Trahison. Panique. Douleur : Joyce et Marshall Harrinam divorcent. Alors qu''un nuage de cendres envahit Manhattan, Joyce se prend à espérer que son mari, employé au World Trade Center, est arrivé à temps au bureau. Miraculeusement rescapé du désastre, Marshall tente d''extorquer aux journalistes le numéro de vol de l''avion qui vient de s''écraser sur le Pentagone. Mais Joyce est finalement restée à New York. C''était trop beau pour être vrai : ils sont bons pour les frais d''avocats. Dès lors, c''est la guerre ouverte, totale, psychologique. Pour la garde des enfants, un peu, pour le grand appartement, surtout. Une solution à l''amiable ? Ils n''y pensent même pas. On ne négocie pas avec les terroristes...

A collection of stories set in Russia.

One year into an impossibly bitter divorce, Marshall and Joyce Harriman, a Brooklyn Heights couple, are at war. On the morning of September 11 each thinks the other is dead, and each is secretly happy. Far from putting things into perspective, the tragedy and aftermath become a counterpoint to the ongoing war to divide Joyce and Marshall''s assets as the Harrimans enact the country''s problems on their pathetically personal scale.

Joyce i Marshall Harriman, que viuen a Brooklyn amb els seus dos fills, estan a punt de divorciar-se. Un matí de finals d''estiu, la Joyce marxa cap a l''aeroport per agafar un vol a San Francisco i en Marshall va a l''oficina, al World Trade Center; però ella perd l''avió i ell arriba tard a la feina. És el matí en què l''horror del terrorisme islamista s''estavella als Estats Units i, convençuts tots dos que l''altre ha mort víctima dels atemptats, no poden evitar sentir-se absolutament feliços.Comèdia negra sobre terrorisme, guerra i problemes conjugals, Un mal propi del país segueix la Joyce i en Marshall en el seu procés de mútua decepció i enllaça aquests sentiments personals amb els estralls i la paranoia a l''Amèrica dels primers temps de la gestió Bush: La Joyce sospita que el seu marit li ha enviat una carta amb àntrax a l''oficina, en Marshall fa plans per construir una bomba.Finalista del National Book Award, aquesta novel·la és una sàtira en què les calamitats polítiques s''enllacen amb els terrors més íntims. Sense dubte, Ken Kalfus és un dels escriptors nord-americans més atrevits i imaginatius del moment.

It''s a familiar New York story: Joyce and Marshall Harriman''s divorce battle escalates from a skirmish to a full-fledged territorial conflict, as both sue for custody of their coveted Brooklyn Heights co-op, and consequently they must both continue to inhabit italong with their two small children, "their divorce''s civilian casualties." Minor acts of domestic terrorism have become an unavoidable part of their daily lives, so when September 11 happens, neither is immediately very jarred. In fact, each thinks the other dead, and celebrates. Far from putting things into perspective, the tragedy and aftermath become a queasily hilarious counterpoint to the ongoing war to divide Joyce and Marshall''s assets. Their pettiness reaches continuously lower depths spying, psychological warfare and even anthrax comes into play. Joyce seduces Marshall''s best friend, and Marshall sabotages Joyce''s sister''s wedding. The Harrimans enact the country''s problems on their pathetically personal scale, but the novel miraculously manages to avoid patness or bombast. As in Jay McInerney''s recent The Good Life, Kalfus puts 9/11 up against the steel-plated narcissism of New Yorkerswith very different, and very funny, results.

One year into an impossibly bitter divorce, Marshall and Joyce Harriman, a Brooklyn Heights couple, are at war. On the morning of September 11 each thinks the other is dead, and each is secretly happy. Far from putting things into perspective, the tragedy and aftermath become a counterpoint to the ongoing war to divide Joyce and Marshall''s assets as the Harrimans enact the country''s problems on their pathetically personal scale.

Twee echtelieden die in scheiding liggen, zijn erg teleurgesteld dat de ander niet is omgekomen bij de terroristische aanslag van 11 september 2001.

Ken Kalfus''s mesmerising first novel is about two events that become milestones in the history of the modern media: the death of Tolstoy and the murder of Lenin. One yound filmmaker was there. The story begins in 1910, as Leo Tolstoy lies dying in Astapovo, a railway station in provincial Russia. Members of the press from around the world have descended upon this sleepy hamlet to record his passing for a public suddenly ravenous for celebrity news. Cinema is the newcomer, and Nikolai Gribshin arrives to capture the extraordinary scene and learn how to wield his camera as a political tool. At this historic moment, he comes across two men - the scientist, Professor Vorobev, and the revolutionist, Joseph Stalin - who have radical, mysterious plans for the future. Soon they will accompany him on a long, cold march through an era of brutality and absurdity, as science struggles with superstition. Brimming with intellect, humour, and rich, inventive storytelling, THE COMMISSARIAT OF ENLIGHTENMENT is a novel of ideas that brilliantly evokes the tragi-comic world of revolutionary Russia as well as the birth of today''s image-based society.