TRANS EUROPE EXPRESS by Elizabeth Lopeman
TRANS EUROPE EXPRESS by Elizabeth Lopeman
An American au pair considers abandoning her German host family on vacation. A French girl is sent to Munich to live with her father, though she doesn't speak his language. An American woman becomes emotionally disoriented by a German actor, a journalist escapes a lover via a bewildering Mediterranean ferry trip, and a former model travels to Amsterdam to try to save a friend. Across these six stories, Elizabeth Lopeman captures the expatriate experience like no other writer. Her characters experience art, work, love, and tragedy as richly strange and sometimes dangerous when carried over borders or translated across cultures. A collection of vivid images and fascinating characters, Trans Europe Express is a smart, exciting new chapter in the literary tradition of Americans searching Europe not only for experience but, ultimately, for identity.
Elizabeth Lopeman's criticism on art and design has appeared in top magazines for years, but it is in this debut story collection that she reveals the full range of her powers as a writer. Trans Europe Express introduces readers to an exciting new voice in American fiction.
Additional Information
Series: Propeller Books Fiction
ISBN: 9780982770443
Pages: 155
Publication Date: 2014
Paperback, 5.25 x 8 in.
PRAISE AND REVIEWS
"I devoured these six stories. At last, a fresh and powerful American voice fully engaged with the wider world—Elizabeth Lopeman writes with an urgent cosmopolitanism that is as knowing as it is rare today. Trans Europe Express is a sharp and sober examination of the appeal, disappointment, and utter disarray that life abroad entails." —Thomas Chatterton Williams, author of Losing My Cool: Love, Literature, and a Black Man's Escape from the Crowd
"Lopeman masterfully renders the allure of the expat life and the internal territories discovered and conquered by women far from all that is familiar to them. Trans Europe Express is a seductive, atmospheric, and intoxicating read, and, like the greatest affairs, the stories in this collection are full of intrigue and beauty." —Patricia Engel, author of It's Not Love, It's Just Paris
“In the world Lopeman creates in her debut story collection Trans Europe Express, unexpected imagery pops and beauty dazzles. Her characters are trenchant, tender, and tough. They are travelers, artists, and seekers like you, dear reader, hoping to be jolted by the new, the old, the real, and the fake, while taking that sublime adventure—life—by the throat.”
—Mary Rechner, author of Nine Simple Patterns for Complicated Women
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Elizabeth Lopeman's writing on art and design has appeared in Sculpture, American Craft, FiberArts, and Bitch, and her fiction has appeared in Propeller and Drain. Trans Europe Express is her first book of fiction. She lives in Munich.