The Club. Takis Wurger

For fans of Donna Tartt’s The Secret History , Joël Dicker’s The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair , Leila Slimani’s The Perfect Nanny , and Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley , The Club is a tantalizing mix of literary writing and a propulsively suspenseful narrative.Like Herman Koch’s breakthrough New York Times -bestseller The Dinner , The Club has been a huge success in Europe and now is poised to capture a big American readership. Like The Dinner it explores the seediness behind the veneer of bourgeois respectability, and is set in the elite world of Cambridge University, among upper class and social climber students—and their families.Würger is one of Germany’s most highly regarded young writers, and the winner of the prestigious lit.Cologne prize for debut fiction. This novel was a huge indie bookstore and word-of-mouth success in Germany, selling over 50,000 hardcover copies there and staying on the bestseller list for months—and the momentum is continuing with the paperback. Würger’s second novel, Stella (which Grove also acquired) has been the subject of major international publishing auctions, and was a strong six-figure deal in Germany. Grove is thrilled to be bringing this brilliantly talented writer to American readers. Würger himself studied at Cambridge, where he boxed for the university team and was a member of the Pitt Club. He knows this world intimately. He also speaks perfect English and will be available for interviews and profiles. The book explores questions of privilege, sexual violence on campus, and takes the reader into the upper echelons of a world of privilege and hedonism. The Pitt Club is a real institution: a private members’ club at Cambridge, similar to the Skull and Bones Club at Yale University in the United States. Its past members allegedly include King George V, economist John Maynard Keynes, and actor Eddie Redmayne. A talented journalist who works as a war reporter for Der Spiegel , Würger was named one of Medium ’s “Top 30 Journalists Under 30” in 2010 and awarded a CNN Journalist Award in 2013. He has reported around the world, including warzones in Afghanistan, Libya, the Ukraine, and the Middle East. The novel is translated by highly regarded translator Charlotte Collins, who is best known for her translation of International Booker shortlisted Robert Seethaler’s A Whole Life . Charlotte studied at Cambridge and once was a waitress for a dinner of the members of the Pitt Club, so it is particularly fitting that she be the one to translate this novel.