Loose Connection

Wackelkontakt

review

‘Loose Connection’ is an inventive literary detective thriller, with two different stories that gradually intertwine and ‘solve’ each other. 

While waiting for an electrician to come and repair a loose connection in one of his power sockets, Franz Escher, a funeral orator by trade, reads a book about Elio Russo, the key witness in a Mafia trial, who is in prison awaiting release into a witness protection programme. Russo is so terrified of reprisals from the people he has betrayed that he lies awake at night, reading a book about a funeral orator called Franz Escher, who is waiting for an electrician to deal with a loose connection.  

As the two men continue to read each other’s stories, Elio is released and adopts a new German identity as Marko Steiner. He marries a woman who, like him, is secretive about her past, and they have a daughter. Meanwhile, Escher accidentally causes the death of his electrician by carelessly switching the fuse connections back on. Stricken with guilt, Escher decides he wants to deliver the eulogy at the electrician’s funeral and begins to investigate the man’s life. The more he learns, the more striking similarities appear between the electrician and the Mafia witness from the book he is reading. Elio/Marko’s teenage daughter, Ala, becomes intrigued by her father’s past and starts to investigate. She picks up the book about Franz Escher and continues reading from where her father had left off.

The characters’ lives become increasingly enmeshed. When Ala is kidnapped in Italy, Escher cashes in some shares to pay the ransom money and travels to Italy to rescue her. Escher and Ala eventually discover that Ala’s father is still alive – he has seemingly faked his death a second time. Perhaps the original electrician in Escher’s flat wasn’t Elio/Marko at all. Before he and his family leave town, he says he will drop by Escher’s apartment to fix the loose connection.  

This wonderful novel is utterly absorbing, following a narrative structure that is like one of M. C. Escher’s artworks – a self-referential loop with labyrinthine twists and turns. ‘Loose Connection’ is a multicultural page-turner that is playful, funny, and accessible, perfect for fans of Jennifer Egan, David Mitchell, and Jasper Fforde.

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Find out more: https://www.hanser-literaturverlage.de/buch/wolf-haas-eigentum-9783446278332-t-4041

press quotes

about the author

© Iglar

Wolf Haas was born in 1960 in Maria Alm am Steinernen Meer. He has received multiple awards for his literary work, including the Bremen Prize for Literature and the Joseph Breitbach Prize. His novels include Das Wetter vor 15 Jahren (2006; The Weather Fifteen Years Ago, 2009, trans. Stephanie Gilardi and Thomas S. Hansen), Verteidigung der Missionarsstellung (‘Defence of the Missionary Position’, 2012) und Junger Mann (‘Young Man’, 2017) as well as nine Brenner-based thrillers, the latest of which is Müll (‘Garbage’, 2022). His novel Eigentum (‘Property’) was recently published by Hanser (2023), and was awarded the Erich Kästner Prize 2024. Wolf Haas lives in Vienna.

Previous works: Eigentum, Carl Hanser Verlag (2023); Junger Mann, Hoffmann und Campe (2018); Verteidigung der Missionarsstellung, Hoffmann und Campe (2012); Das Wetter vor 15 Jahren, Hoffmann und Campe (2006); Ausgebremst. Der Roman zur Formel 1, Rowohlt (1998); Brenner-Krimis, Rowohlt (1996 – 2022).

Previous translations: Brenner and God, Melville House Publishing (2012); Come, Sweet Death!, Melville House Publishing (2014).

rights information

Carl Hanser Verlag

Contact: Friederike Barakat
friederike.barakat@hanser.de
Tel: +49-89-99830-509

https://www.hanser.de/

translation assistance

The English language translation rights to the book have sold.

This page will be updated once an English language translation is published.