No-Signal Area – Robert Perisic (2020)

Witty and ambitious, No-Signal Area is a sprawling novel, smart and just cynical enough to frame and give an edge to the abiding nostalgia that is its real subject. A group of entrepreneurs brings roaring back to life a defunct turbine factory and the town around it, promising a return to the days of dignity, jobs and the good life and bright future that a manufacturing centre can dispense to a small town. But is a return to the days of plenty possible? And what of the changed relationships between lovers, and within families, that have transpired in the years since that earlier time? Perisic takes us there, into the past and into the future, and watches with a bemused sad smile as the inevitable wreaks havoc with the possible. Robert Perisic’s second novel to be translated into English is a cause for delight.