Archipelago (e-book) (used book) | Natalie Bakopoulos | bookbook.eu

Description

A story of odyssey and homecoming, Natalie Bakopoulos's Archipelago is a striking, haunting feat that offers brilliant meditations on the slippery borders of nations, languages, and the self.

In the wake of a carjacking, Archipelago's unnamed narrator leaves the States for a translation writing residency on the Dalmation coast. Along the way, she has an unsettling, aggressive encounter with a man on a Greek ferry, which sets off a series of strange events. At the residency, she reunites with Luka, an old friend from Croatia. Luka calls her Natalia, the name of a character he's written that seems to be based on her. The narrator doesn't correct him, instead allowing this ascribed version of herself to unfold. Un-selfed, she extends her stay, and she and Luka strike up a romantic relationship as she continues her translation work.

The hazy summer stretches on until, after a sudden shift, she reclaims narrative agency and takes a impulsive road trip back to Greece, crossing borders. Spare and lyrical, with subversions of The Odyssey and its Ithaca, Archipelago charts a wending journey back to the narrator's family home--not simply back to a self, but beyond it.