Untitled - Uitgeverij Cossee

Jowi Schmitz – LeopoldWhat it is about? About love, uneasy feelings and baby chickens.Leopold breeds ideas. Thinking about feelings is for the weak. He would rather concentrateon more important matters. Gardening? Keeping piggies? But his terrace is cemented andpigs take up a lot of space. Chickens? That’s it! Baby chickens!Leopold runs to the egg farmer in the little shop at the square, filled with housewives andshopping bags. He hates shopping bags but he ignores the housewives and uses sign languageto communicate his wishes to the Spanish shopkeeper. He has to keep the eggs warm and hewants to take care of his chickens with love. The warmth that this thought radiates almostmakes him forget the cold, silent argument with his daughter.Jowi Schmitz tells the story of a wonderful, inventive, old man who has troubles withdevotion and feelings and who mistakes his family for a chicken run. Just because thechickens accept his attention without any hesitation.Author: Jowi SchmitzAuthor: Jowi SchmitzTitle: Leopold (fiction)Title: Kiss From Your Sister (fiction)Original title: LeopoldOriginal title: Kus van je zusPublished: 2005 Published: 2007Size: 192 pages / 44.000 wordsSize: 192 pages / 50.000 wordsJowi Schmitz - Kiss From Your SisterFollowing on from the 2005 success of Schmitz’s quirky absurdist debut, Leopold, the authoruses her television-writing experience to bring to life a dramatic story about two sisters, oneof who is apparently mortally ill. Vera has always been terrorised by her older sister, Marrit.Vera still feels guilty about abandoning their alcoholic father to his fate, and has not forgottenthe serious bullying of her sister during their childhoods.As both of the sister’s worlds fall apart, Vera loses her grip on reality. What at first seems likethe same old story of a glamourous older sister getting it all, turns out to be a product of theoveractive imagination of an unreliable narrator. At the end of the book though, a pivotalmoment in the sisters’ childhoods is revealed that explains‘With this she lifts her novel above flat realism. Despite all the, sometimes thickly laid,tragedy, there’s still plenty to laugh about.’ - NRC HandelsbladENGLISH SAMPLETRANSLATION AVAILABLE‘A tear-jerker of the first order, despite its amusing asides. The “camera perspective” whichnarrator Vera uses to describe her life is very moden and a bit Bridget Jones-ish.’ –Leeuwarder Courant