Prose

The short stories in this collection are produced by a wellspring of storytelling. The reader is sure to recognize the author by the subject matter and style. Narrative fragments connect past with present, reveal episodes from the lives of the famous, blend fantastical motifs in everyday settings with the deeds, wishes and dreams of ordinary heroes. The reader truly knows their beings, obsessions and sorrows as suddenly he sinks with the narrator to the deepest realms of plausibility. The most authentic thing about Kratochvil is the game that provides for the changing of costumes, masks and points of view. And from behind the masks we hear grotesque, tragi-ironic cries, gasps and – cunning laughter: everything is other! Or might the only substantial truth be the very story you are reading? There are thirteen of them here, all charged with the zest for storytelling. It is a thrilling siege. A hunt with a circle of beaters.  (Zbyněk Fišer)