Красиви снимки от изгубената родина

by Mia Gallagher, Миа Галахър, Мирела Христова (Translator)

Бомбен взрив в лондонското метро раздира времето и пространството и разравя четири човешки истории, които се преплитат, сблъскват се и се разминават.

В наши дни Джорджа Маден (някогашното момченце Джорджи) напуска дома си в Дъблин и поема на пътуване, в което я дебнат скритите опасности от миналото и настоящето ѝ. През 1970-те години, когато семейство Маден започва да се разпада, в живота им се появява провокативна и странна непозната, която за кратко ги сближава. Докато ужасът от бомбата в метрото бавно избледнява, възрастна германка, Анна Бауер, разказва житейската си история пред телевизионен екип. А през цялото време със свистене и подскоци в паралелна реалност ние, посетителите, разглеждаме тревожен и променящ се Музей на загадките.

"Напомня се на посетителите, че предстои да влязат в плаващото пространство на Wunderkammer, където нормалните условности на времето и пространството вече не важат..."

Книгата е част от поредицата Съвременна ирландска литература на ИК Амат-Ах.

Genres: Fiction, Fantasy

614 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2026

Reviews

[Derbhile Graham · Rating 3 out of 5]

I raved about Mia Gallagher's other book, Hellfire, when I read it six years ago, to the extent that I even wrote a blog post about it. So I rushed out and bought this one as soon as it was published. My expectations were high and in some respects, they were met. Mia Gallagher's trademark audacity, inventiveness with language and brilliant characterisation were all there. The story had many strands to it, all strong stories in their own right, but unfortunately, beautiful though they were, they failed to come together to make a whole.

[Niall McArdle · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mia Gallagher‘s huge, tough, remarkable, moving, bizarre, and ultimately tragic Beautiful Pictures of the Lost Homeland is a book not easily forgotten. It’s one of the most adventurous Irish novels in years, taking in issues of terrorism, identity, refugees, transgenderism, and the look and feel of Dublin in the grimy 1970s. A complex, sometimes difficult read. Utterly mesmerising.

[degelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a slow, slow burn, and while describing it to others I said it starts with a bomb and the rest of what you read is shrapnel suspended in space (or frozen in time). The more I read it the more I felt I was being torn up inside- the shrapnel was moving, making millions of little cuts, but in infinitesimal amounts.

This book requires a reader worthy of it. Pay close attention. Take note of the tiniest detail, the links between its different consciences, of everything it infers between the lines. I've never read something so featherlight but heavy as lead at the same time. Not very much happens and yet so much happens within the characters' minds, all of them tortured and running from something.

As an aside my opinion is biased because I personally know the author (however, I haven't spoke to her about this work or was involved with her process). Her debut, HellFire, is one of the most incredible first-person narratives I've read. Ever. This one is incredibly complex and painful, and in some ways begs to be performed as well as read. If you're looking for a challenging puzzle to tease out, then look no further.

[Stability Test account · Rating 2 out of 5]

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[Erika Jost · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is incredible. I was impressed most by the parallel drawn between the arbitrariness of nationhood assignment and the arbitrariness of gender assignment, and the gravely serious (potentially deadly) consequences of each. Flipping between the writing styles for each character/mode of narrative felt effortless.

I picked up this book because I heard the author's interview on Jessa Crispin's podcast, and she discussed the challenge of researching the ethnic cleansing of Germans from Czechoslovakia after WWII, information that comes through in the novel in an interview with Anna Bauer, a Sudeten German woman who fled to England. My family is also ethnically German (Donauschwaben) and was expelled from Yugoslavia (now Serbia) under a similar nationalist program during the same time period. I've never read a novel that addresses the experiences of this population, and it was gratifying to read about the larger significance of this huge piece of my family's story in such a compassionate, intellectual, ambitious novel.

['Mo Gore' · Rating 3 out of 5]

Intricate gamebook full of interesting parallels between different shifting power dynamics and the fluidity of identiy (both national and genderwise) but it is still a bit problematic for a cis- woman to write about the supposed experience of a transwoman, isn't it? A big 'yikes!' was the moment were Geo feels she's being 'punished' for her transition by potentially having breast cancer, as she tried to be 'what she's not supposed to be'...

[Melinda Bailey · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is an interesting story within the present and the past. It can be somewhat difficult to follow at times. I loved the characters.

[Tom M (London) · Rating 1 out of 5]

Interesting enough descriptions of fragments of childhood life recollected. But the children are not interesting.
Reading this book is like sitting in a room overhearing other people's conversation. There is no plot. Nothing actually happens.
The structure of the book is chaotic and includes many detailed descriptions of maps we cannot see.
There are sections in different fonts, and strange code numbers that refer to God only knows what.
The book is enormous and heavy but there is no plot. Just disparate pieces thrown together, adding up to nothing.
What a load of rubbish.

[Anne Goodwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This hefty book of almost 500 pages of small print is fat with fascinating stories and beautiful prose, but it does require some effort from the reader if she is to partake of all that’s on offer and especially if she is to grasp the full force of the links between them all.
Full review http://annegoodwin.weebly.com/1/post/...