Among the Ruins

In a small town full of bizarre figures, Vargová, a patient with a wretched past and an even worse present, writes letters to the psychiatrist Juraj Felešlegi. He urgently needs help himself: he gives more time to drinking than to his patients, hands out wise advice in cafés and pubs, and makes mysterious trips abroad. Other voices join theirs, unnamed patients, colleagues and pub regulars, in a fragmentary, many-voiced story where the line between doctor and patient blurs and the world looks like one big hospital. In their disjointed talk the 'diseases' of society show through: conspiracy theories, xenophobia, pathological nationalism.

AI-generated summary

About the book

Form

Novel

Length

261 pages in the original

Genres

Satire (assigned by AI)

Set in

Slovakia

First published

2021 by Koloman Kertész Bagala

Author's age

54 when first published

ISBN

9788089973583 (original)

9781914990236 (Jantar Publishing, United Kingdom)