Natural Novel

The most translated Bulgarian novel after 1989 Natural Novel appeared in 22 languages, including English, French, German, Spanish, Italian, and, most recently, Icelandic. The book is widely reviewed across Europe and the US.

A man’s life suddenly breaks down, his wife is pregnant but he is not "the author of her pregnancy". While he is slowly descending into homelessness, the story of his failure constantly slips away and merges into a natural history of the lavatory, the flies, the bees. His effort to create a novel of beginnings mysteriously coincides with the destinies of two other characters: an editor of the same name, Georgi Gospodinov, and a mad gardener (natural scientist) who is trying to restore the lost harmony between words and things.

A novel of ideas following Linnaeus, Darwin, but also Michel Foucault, set in the turbulent Eastern Europe of the 90’s.

About Natural Novel:

…a quirky, compulsively readable book that deftly hints at the emptiness and sadness at its core
The New York Times

…anarchic, experimental début
The New Yorker

…humorous, melancholy and highly idiosyncratic work
The Times

…both earthy and intellectual
The Guardian

Small and elegant masterpiece
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung

Humorist of the desperation
Neue Zuercher Zeitung

Georgi Gospodinov wants to blow your mind - or maybe just provide the ultimate bathroom reader
The Village Voice

…a quick and enjoyable - and surprisingly affecting - work
Complete Review

A machine for stories…
Le Courrier, Geneva

funny and erudite, arrogant and refined, but brilliant in every respect and innovative in its form
Livres-Hebdo, Paris