The new works of Romanian authors were among the bestsellers of this year’s Bookfest International Book Fair, Agerpres reported.

Bookfest, which ended May 28 in Bucharest, is one of the two major yearly book fairs taking place in the capital, alongside the Gaudeamus book fair.

Andrei Pleșu’s Despre inimă și alte eseuri (On the Heart and Other Essays) as the best sold title of Humanitas publishing house at this year’s edition of the fair. It was followed by România, o iubire din care se poate muri (Romania, A Love That Can Be Fatal) by Gabriel Liiceanu, Mistica rugăciunii și a revolverului. Viața lui Corneliu Zelea Codreanu (The Mystique of the Prayer and Gun. The Life of Corneliu Zelea Codreanu) by Tatiana Niculescu, Am fost cândva femeie de onoare (I Used To Be An Honorable Woman) by Radu Paraschivescu, and Peisaj după isterie (Landscape After Hysteria) by Mircea Cărtărescu.

The top five sales at Humanitas Fiction publishing house include the Romanian-language translations of Aviator by Evgheni Vodolazkin, Here I Am by Jonathan Safran Foer, Vanessa and Her Sister by Priya Parmar, The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea by Yukio Mishima, and Metamorphosis. An Anthology of Antemortem Prose by Franz Kafka.

O zi din viața Deliei (A Day in the Life of Delia) by Delia Calancia led the sales at Humanitas Junior. It was followed by Secretul monstrului (The Secret of the Monster) by Otilia Mantelers, Pandora by Victoria Turnbull, George and the Blue Moon by Stephen and Lucy Hawking, and Cetatea sufletelor (The Fortress of Souls) by Ana Alfianu.

Humanitas, Humanitas Fiction and Humanitas Junior are part of the Humanitas group.

In the Romanian literature category, Polirom publishing house’s best title was Imperiul pisicilor (The Empire of the Cats) by Alex Tocilescu. Cel care cheamă câinii (The One Who Calls the Dogs) by Lucian Dan Teodorovici came second, and it was followed by Mâța Vinerii (Friday’s Cat) by Doina Ruști, Pereți subțiri (Thin Walls) by Ana Maria Sandu, and Hanul lui Manuc (Manuc’s Inn) by Simona Antonescu.

The Red-Haired Woman by Orhan Pamuk led the fair sales in the foreign literature category. It was followed by The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu, The Counterlife by Philip Roth, Augustus by John Williams, and L'Archipel d'une autre vie (TheArchipelago of Another Life) by Andrei Makine.

De ce este România astfel. Avatarurile excepționalismului românesc (Why is Romania Different. The Avatars of Romanian Exceptionalism) by Romanian anthropologist Vintilă Mihăilescu led Polirom’s non-fiction sales. Aurora Liiceanu’s Madlena came second, followed by Jurnal scoțian (Scottish Journal) by Ioan-Florin Florescu, Life by Keith Richards, and Viața mea (My Life) by Nicolae Breban.

Curtea Veche Publishing had its Bookfest best-seller with Fericirea e un ac de siguranță (Happiness is a Safety Pin) by Răzvan Exarhu. Spovedania unui preot ateu (The Confession of an Atheist Priest) by de Ion Aion was the second best sold title. It was followed by Mikhail Shishkin’s Paltonul cu gaică (a collection of short stories and essays translated in Romanian as The Coat with a Strap), The Story of the Peleș Castle by Prince Radu of Romania and Psihologie pentru oameni obișnuiți (Psychology for Ordinary People) by Ramona and Radu F. Constantinescu.

The Romanian-language translation of The Book of Mirrors, the best seller first published in English of Eugen Ovidiu Chirovici took the first sales spot at RAO publishing house. It was followed by Quicksand by Malin Persson Giolito, and Operation Caesar by Garance Le Caisne.

Paul Beatty’s The Sellout, the 2016 ManBooker prize winner, was a best seller at Litera publishing house. Karl Ove Knausgĺrd’s My Struggle. Book Four came in second. Meik Wiking’s The Little Book of Hygge came third, followed by Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly, and To Hell and Back. Europe, 1914-1949 by Ian Kershaw.

The most sought after titles at Nemira publishing house were Story of Your Life by Ted Chiang, Born Survivor by Bear Grylls, În spatele blocului (Behind the Block) by Mara Wagner and The Tea Planter's Wife by Dinah Jefferies.

In the Romanian literature category, Paralela 45 publishing house’s best sold title was Peștele cu aripi (The Fish with Wings) by Răsvan Popescu. It was followed by Cu mintea mea de femeie (With My Woman’s Mind) by Mihaela Miroiu, #Rezist! Poezia (#Rezist! Poetry), an anthology coordinated by Cosmin Perța and Povestiri din București (Stories from Bucharest) by Dana Fodor Mateescu.

editor@romania-insider.com

(Photo source: Bookfest Facebook Page)