The Pelican

“[A] funny, serious, clever novel.” —The New York Times

From award-winning Dutch author Martin Michael Driessen comes a fearlessly funny tragedy about an improbable friendship, unstable dreams, missed opportunities, and epic coincidence.

In a quiet coastal town in Yugoslavia, two men seeking more than the Communist regime can offer find their lives deceitfully entwined.

Andrej is a postman in complete denial of his existence. He yearns for respect and fame but commits petty crimes for reasons he doesn’t fully comprehend. Josip is an increasingly irrelevant cable car operator and unfaithfully married. Life was so much simpler when neither one knew the other’s secrets. Now that they do—discovered quite by accident—each man has resorted to blackmailing the other. As their anonymous misdeeds escalate, a farce of mutual dependency begins. So does the unlikeliest of friendships when Andrej and Josip finally meet face-to-face.

In a tale set against the impending wars, Martin Michael Driessen ingeniously explores the foibles of two painfully ordinary men boldly staking their claims on life.

Martin Michael Driessen is a Dutch opera and theater director, translator, and writer. He is the author of the novels Gars, Father of God, A True Hero, Rivers (which was awarded the prestigious ECI Literature Prize), and The Pelican. Writing as Eva Wanjek, he cowrote the novel Lizzie with highly acclaimed and prize-nominated poet Liesbeth Lagemaat. In 2018 he published a collection of short stories, My First Murder. His work has been translated into English, Italian, German, Spanish, Slovenian, and Hungarian. For more information, visit www.martinmichaeldriessen.com.

Jonathan Reeder, a native of Upstate New York and longtime resident of Amsterdam, enjoys a dual career as a literary translator and performing musician. Along with his work as a professional bassoonist, he translates opera libretti and essays on classical music, as well as contemporary Dutch fiction and poetry. His translated novels include Conny Braam’s The Cocaine Salesman, Peter Buwalda’s Bonita Avenue, Bram Dehouck’s comic thriller Sleepless Summer, and Tonio by Adri van der Heijden. Additionally, he has translated novels, essays, and short stories by Mano Bouzamour, Christine Otten, Maarten Inghels, and Rodaan Al Galidi.