Summary: a dream-like account of the nightmare of totalitarianism

In 1943 the German army approaches the Albanian city of Gjiorkaster, planning a brutal reprisal for an ineffectual Albanian ambush on the column. However the city is home to a close university friend of the German commander, and at a dinner between the two the salvation of the city is negotiated.

Or maybe not. What actually happened at the dinner is a source of much speculation, not least by the Communists who take power after the Germans. They begin to wonder is this actually evidence of some existential threat to their system.

This is a novel of the competing rumours that emerge from this dinner, each as haunting as the dark folk tales that swirl around the city and that these rumours echo. It is a book about the history and culture of Albania, and how the myths of the past cast their bloody influence across time right up to the present day.

It is a strange and haunting story, beautifully written and elegantly translated..