The Queen of Spades

As in his widely praised Fists, Pietro Grossi¿s The Break brings out the epic human drama in a tale of everyday life in lucid, stripped-down prose. Dino is a placid, unambitious man. Living in a small provincial town, he and his wife spend their time planning journeys to faraway places - journeys they never take. Dino¿s only passion is billiards, and he spends his evenings in the local billiards hall honing his technique. One day, however, Dino¿s quiet life is interrupted - his wife falls pregnant. This the first in a series of events that shake him from his slumber and force Dino to test himself for the first time.

Pietro Grossi, writer and translator, was born in 1978 in Florence and currently lives and works in Tuscany. He is a great admirer of Hemingway and J D Salinger, and has been writing since he was eight years old. His first novel Fists, also published by Pushkin Press, was shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize.