Werner BrA unig was once regarded as the great hope of East German literature-until an extract from Rummelplatz was read before the East German censorship authorities in 1965, and fierce opposition summarily sealed its fate. The novel's sin? It painted an all too accurate picture of East German society. Rummelplatz, translated here by Samuel P. Willcocks, focuses on a notorious East German uranium mine, run by the Soviets and supplying the brotherland's nuclear program. Veterans, fortune seekers, and outsiders with tenuous family ties like narrator Peter Loose flock to the well-paying mine, but soon find their new lives bleak. Safety provisions are almost nonexistent and tools are not adequately supplied. The only outlets for workers are the bars and fairgrounds where copious amounts of alcohol are consumed and brawls quickly ensue. In Rummelplatz, BrA unig paints his characters as intrinsically human and treats the death of each worker, no matter how poor, as a great tragedy. BrA unig occupies a cultlike status in Germany, and this new translation of his masterpiece is an excellent introduction for English-language readers. Praise for the German edition "One of the best novels of postwar Germany...The narrative force and the emotional punch are sensational."-Die Zeit "An event in literary history and one 'helluva' novel."-Der Spiegel

"Of course I had to end up here . . ." Over ten rainy nights, Thomas, an ex-bargeman who used to be skipper of his own boat, walks the muddy fields of the landlocked German interior and remembers the events that lost him his home, his boat, and his livelihood: his apprenticeship in the cold halls of the Royal Naval College in London; the dangers of the mean streets and waterfront of New York in the 1970s, and Poland under martial law; Germany after the reunification, when for a year or so it seemed that the whole country drifted rudderless, drawn by the current of history to who knows where. In this novel from Gert Loschutz,Thomas remembers childhood, his first love, and the warnings of his grandfather: Beware the dark company! This mysterious band of men and women dressed in black cast a shadow over his story, as he wrestles with the secrets, the unplumbed depths of his soul, the hazards lurking below a seemingly placid surface, and throughout it all, the rain, falling night after night. Dark Company is a superb example of a distinctly German tradition in weird fiction which claims its roots in Kafka and Herbert Rosendorfer.

Singers Die Twice is the story of a life in music. One of Germany's best-known exponents of North Indian classical music, specifically dhrupad singing, Perer Pannke has traveled from his home in Germany to Varanasi, Delhi, Darbhanga, and the forests of Vrindaban to study classical Indian singing in the most famous gharanas-musical houses-of India. His richly woven story takes readers from the legendary beginning of the gharana in the eighteenth century into the last splendid days of the Maharaja of Darbhanga-the inspiration for Satyajit Ray's 1957 classic film, The Music Room-and into the present. Along the way, we meet legendary singers whose names are still known to the devotees of dhrupad: the grand old Pandit Ram Chatur Mallik, the pious and inspiring Pandit Vidur Mallik, and both the masters and the humbler musicians and traveling players who bring music to the fields of Bihar, across India, and beyond. Singers Die Twice is the inspiring story of a master musician in the world that he loves.

"Singers Die Twice" is the story of a life in music. One of Germany's best-known exponents of North Indian classical music, specifically dhrupad singing, Perer Pannke has traveled from his home in Germany to Varanasi, Delhi, Darbhanga, and the forests of Vrindaban to study classical Indian singing in the most famous gharanas - musical houses - of India. His richly woven story takes readers from the legendary beginning of the gharana in the eighteenth century into the last splendid days of the Maharaja of Darbhanga - the inspiration for Satyajit Ray's 1957 classic film, "The Music Room" - and into the present. Along the way, we meet legendary singers whose names are still known to the devotees of dhrupad: the grand old Pandit Ram Chatur Mallik, the pious and inspiring Pandit Vidur Mallik, and both the masters and the humbler musicians and traveling players who bring music to the fields of Bihar, across India, and beyond. "Singers Die Twice" is the inspiring story of a master musician in the world that he loves.