The Bone Fire

“It is as sinister as it is stunningly beautiful. It is the work of a master.” —Julia Phillips, author of Disappearing Earth

A New York Times Editors' Choice Finalist for the Prix du Meilleur LivreÉtranger (France) Finalist for the Premio von Rezzori (Italy) Long-listed for the Prix Femina (France) "[The Bone Fire] achieves a disconcerting juxtaposition of the mundane and the primeval. On one level, it’s a real-world coming-of-age story, in which a teenager navigates both post-Communist aftershocks and the more personal issues of menstruation, crushes, friendships and bathing suits — and on another, it’s a tale of magic, ghosts and ancient memory . . . The timing is perfect: The novel reaches an American audience at a moment when we’re feeling not only the seismic shifts of historical change, and the hard reckoning after a strongman’s fall, but also the ways magical thinking, conspiracy and rumor seep through the cracks during times of turmoil . . . This is a story, after all, in which dreams and phantasms are kinder and more sensical than the random brutality of the concrete world. To that end, his telling is not just magic, but enchantment."—Rebecca Makkai, New York Times Book Review  “Anything can happen in The Bone Fire—and everything does. Dragomán puts us in the middle of our most wondrous and terrifying childhood fairytales, somehow unhazing their dreaminess and replicating their electrifying uncertainty all at once.”—Téa Obreht, bestselling author of Inland and The Tiger's Wife "The Bone Fire exposes the magic and mystery behind so much of what we accept in our lives to be fact: that parents die, that children grow up, that regimes change, that we keep going. It traces, thanks to György Dragomán's deft hand, in Ottilie Mulzet's careful, confident translation, the places where fairy tale lands and post-Soviet territories meet. It is as sinister as it is stunningly beautiful. It is the work of a master."—Julia Phillips, author of Disappearing Earth "Nested in this novel’s magical setting is the darkly-glinting stone of a turbulent political history of secrets, betrayals, ghosts, and memory. Dragomán’s exigent concerns, his transitionless subject-verb-object sentences, and his terrific gift for sensual details give this book its breathless, detective-fiction-like pacing. It will pierce you like a knitting needle. "—Forrest Gander, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and author of Twice Alive "A poignant coming-of-age tale set against the backdrop of regime change." —Kirkus Reviews "[An] evocative work of magic realism... Fans of Gabriel García Márquez may want to have a look." —Publishers Weekly —

"[An] evocative work of magic realism.” —Publishers Weekly

“A poignant coming-of-age tale set against the backdrop of regime change.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Nested in this novel’s magical setting is the darkly-glinting stone of a turbulent political history of secrets, betrayals, ghosts, and memory. Dragomán’s…terrific gift for sensual details give this book its breathless, detective-fiction-like pacing. It will pierce you like a knitting needle. " —Forrest Gander, Pulitzer Prize–winning author

“Anything can happen in The Bone Fire—and everything does. Dragomán puts us in the middle of our most wondrous and terrifying childhood fairytales, somehow unhazing their dreaminess and replicating their electrifying uncertainty all at once.” —Téa Obreht,, New York Times bestselling author