Love novel
(Book)

"First published in English translation by V&Q Books, Berlin, in 2022"--Title page verso.

"Love in late capitalism: in an unnamed city, a husband and wife wage a silent war of rage and resentment. He, an out-of-work Dante scholar, is trying to change the world -- and write a novel. She was once a passable actress, but now she's failing at breastfeeding. They take on gigs and debts. He drinks cheap wine; she cleans obsessively. In their two-room flat the tension rises and turns exquisite: the rent is past due, their careers have stalled, the regime is crumbling, and there's always the baby, the baby who won't stop crying. Intense and astutely ironic, devastating and darkly comic, Ivana Sajko's Love Novel takes a scalpel to the heart of modern married life."--Back cover.

"Love in late capitalism: Ivana Sajko takes us to the frontlines of a war waged between kitchen and bedroom. He, an unemployed Dante scholar, trying to change the world and write a novel. She, once a passable actress with a vaguely rewarding theater job, now a stay-at-home mom. He is delirious with dreams of grandeur; she is on edge, a detonator bomb with a dirty laundry trigger. The rent is late, the neighbor caviling, the government astoundingly callous: with violence looming on all sides, husband and wife circle one another in a dizzying dance towards the abyss. Intense and astutely ironic, devastating and darkly comic, Ivana Sajko's Love Novel takes a scalpel to the heart of modern married life."--,Provided by publisher.

In English, translated from the Croatian.