Dan Chaon, Ill Will

丹‧查恩《怨念》

Dustin, a Cleveland psychologist in his 40s, is still damaged by the monstrous¹ murder of his parents, aunt and uncle when he was 13. He testified against his older foster brother Rusty², who was sentenced to life in prison. Dustin’s wife is dying from ovarian cancer, and he can barely connect with his teenage sons. His professional distance is challenged by Aqil, a new client, a former policeman obsessed³ with a string of drownings of drunken young men. And he learns that new DNA⁴ evidence has freed Rusty. As Aqil draws Dustin into an amateur investigation⁵, Rusty reaches out to Dustin’s troubled son Aaron. Imagine the shower scene in Psycho, extended across 11 sections and three decades, with multiple unsolved mysteries. That’s the level of intensity⁶ Chaon achieves in this dark, provocative⁷ thriller⁸.

达斯汀是美国克里夫兰州一位40多岁的心理学家。他13岁时，父母、叔叔和婶婶都被人残忍杀害，这件事给他造成阴影到现在都没散去。他曾经作证指控自家收养的兄弟罗斯缇是凶手，后者被判处终身监禁。达斯汀的妻子患卵巢癌，将不久于人世，而他与自己十几岁的儿子们关系又很疏离。他一贯保持的专业距离被一位新客户阿基尔打破了。阿基尔以前是警察，一直沉迷于追踪一系列醉酒青年溺亡案件。达斯汀还得知，因为有了新的DNA证据，罗斯缇已经被释放了。阿基尔带着达斯汀展开业余调查的时候，罗斯缇开始接近达斯汀的儿子艾伦。想象一下电影《惊魂记》里的那个谋杀场景，横跨了三十年，延续了11部作品，引出多个未解之谜。查恩在这本充满黑暗又让人欲罢不能的惊悚小说中描绘的就是如《惊魂记》那样的紧张氛围。

Hannah Tinti, The Twelve Lives of Samuel Hawley

汉娜•亭蒂《塞缪尔•霍利的十二种生活》

Loo’s mother Lily is dead, her devoted⁹ father Samuel is a mystery she deciphers through the dozen bullet wounds on his body – he, remarkably¹⁰ is alive – and his personal mementoes. At the age of 12 he teaches her how to shoot a gun. Shortly after, he moves her to her mother’s hometown, a Massachusetts fishing village. There they subsist¹¹ mostly on his catch and Loo deals with being an outsider at school. Over the years Loo questions her mother’s death by drowning and discovers elements of her father’s criminal past. Tinti spells it out in chapters based on each of the bullets that pierced his body (Bullet Number Three on Whidbey Island; Number Six in Alaska within view of the glacier¹² where icebergs¹³ are born).

卢的妈妈莉莉去世了，一直深爱她的父亲塞缪尔还健在，但他一直是个谜。卢通过父亲身上的十几处枪伤和他的一些个人收藏物品试图解开这个谜团。在卢12岁的时候，父亲就教她打枪。之后不久，父亲就把她带到了她母亲的家乡，马萨诸塞州的一个小渔村。在那里，他们主要靠父亲打渔为生，卢在学校里一直是个局外人。多年以来，卢一直对母亲溺亡一事存疑，还发现了一些父亲过往犯罪行为的蛛丝马迹。亭蒂依照卢的父亲身体里子弹的顺序展开整个故事（比如：第三颗子弹，惠德比岛；第六颗子弹，能看见冰川的阿拉斯加）。

Domenico Starnone, Ties

多米尼科•斯塔诺内《牵绊》

Novelist Jhumpa Lahiri’s first published translation of an Italian text is the 11th novel from the Strega-award winning Neapolitan writer Starnone. It’s a story of family ties disrupted, and of the echoes of marital¹⁴ distress¹⁵ played out over many decades, into the next generation. Starnone toggles between past and present, giving equal time to the voices of Vanda and her husband Aldo, and adding the perspectives of their son Sandro and daughter Anna. He frames his tale with a mysterious home invasion. Each detail resonates, from the name of the family cat to the idiosyncratic way in which Aldo ties his shoes to his cherished Polaroids. Distinguished¹⁶ by its distinctive¹⁷ characters and clarity of tone, Ties is a gem¹⁸.

小说家裘帕•拉希莉出版的第一本源自意大利语的译作是史特雷加文学奖获得者、来自意大利那不勒斯的斯塔诺内的第11本小说。这是一个关于破裂的家庭关系，以及婚姻困扰持续几十年，以致影响到下一代的故事。斯塔诺内的叙述在过去和现在之间不断切换，给予莞达和她的丈夫阿尔多相当的篇幅来展现各自的视角，后来还加入了他们的儿子桑德罗和女儿安娜的视角。他以一起奇怪的入室案件搭起整个故事的框架。书中的每个细节都有深意，从他们家猫的名字，到阿尔多系鞋带的怪异方式，以及他爱不释手的拍立得相机。每个角色都特点鲜明，节奏明晰。《牵绊》确是一部佳作。

Meg Howrey, The Wanderers

梅格‧荷瑞《漫游者》

Howrey’s new novel was inspired by a 2011 news report on Mars500, a 520-day simulation of a space trip to Mars with a six-member crew from Russia, China and Europe. She gives equal time to Yoshi, Sergei and Helen, a crew of three astronauts from Japan, Russia and the US, who hope to be chosen for the Mars mission sponsored by a private company. As they endure a 17-month simulation, each must prove to have the stamina¹⁹, sanity²⁰ and discipline to withstand the enforced isolation²¹ and the series of calculated failures created by the “sim” team. The key question for each: “Does it feel real?”

荷瑞的这部新作灵感来源于2011年一篇有关“火星500”项目的新闻报道。该项目是一个为期520天的模拟火星考察项目，由来自俄罗斯、中国和欧洲的六名宇航员参与。她的小说中有三位主人公，来自日本的Yoshi，俄罗斯的Sergei以及美国的Helen。他们三人都希望能被选中参加这个由私人公司赞助的火星项目。他们要经历17个月的模拟训练，每个人都必须证明自己有毅力、足够的理性以及自律经受强制隔离的环境以及模拟团队设置的一系列故障。每个人面临的一个最重要的问题是：“跟真实场景感觉一样吗？”

Douglas Coupland, Bit Rot

道格拉斯•库普兰《数据退化》

Canadian writer, designer and artist Coupland names his new collection of stories and essays for a digital archiving term describing how files can spontaneously decompose²³. With characteristic wit, he extends that term to describe “the way my brain has been feeling since 2000, as I shed older and weaker neurons and connections and create and enhance new and unexpected ones.” Bit Rot offers priceless insights. Few people are better at explaining the ramifications²⁴ of the digital era.

加拿大作家、设计师及艺术家库普兰用一个数字存档专业术语给自己最新的故事散文集命名。这个bit rot指存档的文件会自行分解消融。他用自己独有的智慧将这一概念进行了扩展，将其用来描述“自2000年以来我大脑的感觉，我抛弃老旧、疲弱的神经元及其联系，建立并加强了新的以及意外发现的神经关联。” 《数据退化》一书提供的深入见解非常宝贵。没几个人能比他更善于解读数字时代产生的影响。

Jami Attenberg, All Grown Up

洁米・艾廷博格《长大成人》

Andrea Bern is turning 40 soon. She’s an independent woman: “I’m alone. I’m a drinker. I’m a former artist. I’m a shrieker²⁵ in bed.” Still, despite eight years in therapy, she’s questioning what it means to be an adult. She left art school in Chicago to come back to New York (“Spiritually, it’s a reverse commute”). She left her art career for a full-time²⁶ job, chose not to marry or have a child. She’s paid off her student loans, and furnished an apartment. Attenberg captures the kaleidoscopic²⁷ flow of Andrea’s life in spare and witty²⁸ vignettes that build to a surprising and moving conclusion.

安德莉亚・伯恩马上就40岁了。她是位独立女性：“我独自一人，我爱喝酒，我以前是个艺术家，我床事的时候会尖叫。”可是，虽然经过了八年的治疗，她依然不明白作为一个成年人意味着什么。她离开芝加哥的艺术学校，回到纽约（“从精神上来说，这是一次倒退”）。她放弃艺术事业，选择了一份全职的工作，她选择不结婚、不生孩子。她还清了学生贷款，精心布置了自己的房间。艾廷博格用一些精巧布局的小花絮捕捉到了安德莉亚生活中的一些片段，而这些花絮最终构成了一个令人意外又感人的结局。

Paul La Farge, The Night Ocean

保罗・拉・法基《夜之海》

The bizarre and the scandalous float through this novel, an alternate history that speculates about the connection between seminal²⁹ American horror writer HP Lovecraft and a gay fan named Robert Barlow. The two lived together for several months in 1934, when Lovecraft was 43 and Barlow was 16. They collaborated³⁰ on a story called The Night Ocean before Lovecraft died in 1937. La Farge constructs a story within a story filled with artifice³¹ – a faux document (the Erotonimicon, a supposed Lovecraft diary), false identities and faked suicides. Psychiatrist³² Marina Willett watches as her husband Charlie becomes obsessed with Lovecraft and believes he has found Barlow alive and living in Canada. Then Charlie disappears. This many-layered literary mystery is chockablock with surprise appearances – William Burroughs, Ursula Le Guin, Diego Rivera, Roy Cohn, to name a few.

这本小说由怪异事件和丑闻贯穿始终。其实，这个故事是对知名的美国恐怖小说作家HP・洛夫克莱夫特和一个同性恋粉丝罗伯特・巴罗之间隐秘关系猜测的另类改编。1934年，43岁的洛夫克莱夫和16岁的巴罗一起住了几个月。他们在1937年，洛夫克莱夫特去世之前，合作完成了一个名为《夜之海》的故事。拉・法基很巧妙地在一个故事里构建了另一个故事——一份假档案（据称是洛夫克莱夫的日记）、假身份以及假自杀案。玛丽娜・威力特眼看着丈夫查理痴迷于洛夫克莱夫，他认为他已经找到了生活在加拿大的巴罗。然后，查理就失踪了。这部故事层次丰富的神秘作品里面还有不少名作家意外现身，其中包括：威廉・伯罗斯、厄休拉•勒奎恩、迭戈•里维拉以及罗依•康等。

Helene Cooper, Madame President

海伦•库伯《女总统》

Pulitzer Prize-winning American journalist Cooper, who was born in Liberia, traces the rise of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, the first democratically elected female president in Africa and a 2011 Nobel Peace Prize winner. Sirleaf was born in 1938, educated in Monrovia and the US (including a master’s degree at Harvard), and served as finance minister. Jailed by the military dictator Samuel Doe, she went into exile. In the 2005 presidential elections, Sirleaf generated a huge voting bloc³³ of Liberian women, leading her to victory. Cooper’s incisive³⁴ portrait is undergirded by her reporting on the country’s internal power struggles and years of dictatorial³⁵ rule, Doe’s bloody³⁶ military coup²² and civil war sparked by the notoriously brutal³⁷ Charles Taylor. She also details the challenges Sirleaf met, including a $4.7 billion debt and the Ebola virus.

曾经获得普利策奖的美国记者库伯出生于利比里亚，她在本书中追踪记录了非洲首位民选女总统及2011年诺贝尔和平奖获得者埃伦•约翰逊•瑟利夫的成功之路。瑟利夫出生于1938年，曾在蒙罗维亚和美国接受教育（在哈佛大学获得硕士学位），担任过利比里亚财政部长。被军事独裁者塞缪尔•杜伊监禁之后，瑟利夫开始流亡生涯。在2005年的总统选举中，瑟利夫获得了大量女性选民的支持，并最终获胜。库伯对于利比里亚国内的政权争斗、多年独裁统治、杜伊的血腥军事政变以及由凶残的查尔斯•泰勒引发的内战的报道为她的深入描写提供了坚实的基础。她同时还详细描写了瑟利夫面临的各种挑战，其中包括47亿美元的债务和埃博拉病毒。

Mathias Enard, Compass

马蒂亚斯•埃纳尔《罗盘》

Compass chronicles one long night of memory, opium³⁸, illness and insomnia³⁹ spent by Franz Ritter, a musicologist with an interest in Iranian music. Franz is entranced with the intersection⁴⁰ of East and West, and with Sarah, a copper-haired academic with a fiery⁴¹ intellect. Now Sarah has written him from Sarawak, bringing up recollections, including their intimate overnight in Palmyra, academic conferences in Tehran, a voyage to Beirut with Nadim, the Iranian musician she marries. Haunted by unrequited love, Franz meditates⁴² on his treasured compass, once owned by Beethoven, which always points east. Compass, which won France’s Priz Goncourt, is poetic⁴³, ironic⁴⁴, irresistible⁴⁵.

罗盘》记述的是对伊朗音乐颇有兴趣的音乐学者弗朗兹•瑞德在回忆、鸦片、疾病和失眠中度过的一个漫漫长夜。弗朗兹痴迷于东西方的交融，他还对一位棕色头发、学术观点犀利的女孩莎拉着了迷。他收到了莎拉从沙捞越给他写来的信，引发了诸多回忆：他们在巴尔米拉共度的良宵，在德黑兰参加的学术会议，和莎拉的丈夫、伊朗音乐家纳迪姆一起乘船去贝鲁特。因为被这段单相思困扰，弗朗兹拿着他的宝贝罗盘陷入沉思。这个罗盘总是指向东方，贝多芬曾经是这个罗盘的主人。《罗盘》曾获得法国龚古尔奖，是一本富有诗意、充满讽刺，让人难以抵抗的作品。

Elif Batuman, The Idiot

艾丽芙•巴特曼《白痴》

Selin, the daughter of Turkish immigrants, arrives at Harvard in 1995 – at the dawn of email – ready to take on all intellectual challenges that come her way. She makes friends with Svetlana, a Serbian classmate, and becomes close with Ivan, a Hungarian upperclassman. Thanks to Ivan, she spends the summer after her freshman⁴⁶ year in Europe, with a job teaching English in Hungarian villages. Seline is open-minded and adventurous⁴⁷ (“I got on a random⁴⁸ tram to see where it went,” she notes during a visit to Budapest). Batuman’s sardonic⁴⁹ wit makes for a delectable⁵⁰ unfolding of Selin’s experience of love, life and language.

赛琳是一位土耳其移民的女儿，她在1995年，电子邮件刚诞生的时候，来到哈佛大学，准备迎接学业上的各种挑战。她跟班里来自塞尔维亚的同学Svetlana成为了朋友，跟一位匈牙利上层男士Ivan关系变得亲密。因为Ivan的关系，赛琳在大一之后的那个暑假去了欧洲，在一个匈牙利村子里教英语。赛琳思想开放又很有冒险精神（她在记录一次布达佩斯之旅时写道：“我随便坐上了一辆电车，就想看看它往哪儿开”）。巴特曼的冷幽默智慧让赛琳的爱情、生活以及语言经历以一种令人愉悦的方式展开。