Mikhail Elizarov, born in 1973 in the Ukraine, studied philosophy and film direction in Kharkov and worked as a cameraman in the 1990s. He then moved to Hanover, Germany to study cinema. In 2001, his first novel Fingernails caught the attention of the media and was shortlisted for the Andrei Bely Prize and his fourth novel The Librarian was awarded the 2008 Russian Booker Prize. Mikhail Elizarov has also written short stories and essays and contributes to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and magazines including GQ and Playboy. He currently lives in Germany.
Uncompromising, bizarre and desperate Gazeta.ru A truly bright author and an ingenious writer -- Vladimir Sorokin, author of Ice Trilogy and Day of the Oprichnik Belongs to that glittering vein of the burlesque and fantastic, which runs through the strata of Russian literature like a seam of gold Magazine Litteraire Powerful, disturbing, and at the same time, uplifting Vzgliad The most radical of Russian Booker winners Snob.ru Elizarov is an heir to the classic Russian writers Prochtenie.ru How words can be more dangerous than machine-guns Proza.ru A world of myths... and a requiem for a broken country Questions of Literature The Librarian reads like cold fire, full of Russian stoicism, honor and intense formality, but the rhythm of the words is hypnotic Blogcritics This chaotic tale puts a magical twist on its satire Publishers Weekly The Librarian ticks all the boxes available to a satire on totalitarianism and the opiate of religion... Clever... A romping good tale... Pretty sensational. Transformative Big Issue A novel that makes profound questions playful and playfulness profound Russia Beyond the Headlines [A] raucous masterpiece... with a joke on every page, bizarre flights of ribald fancy, extraordinary characters and acute observation about what is going wrong with post-Soviet Russia Daily Mail Mikhail Elizarov has written a highly imaginative satire on the dichotomy in the post-Soviet Russian psyche, populated by the detritus of modern Russia... a thoroughly engaging, if at times deeply troubling, trawl through Russia's lower depths. openDemocracy Elizarov... has written a nightmare from which we do not wake up. The Tablet Immensely entertaining, The Librarian lives up to comparisons to the work of Gogol and Bulgakov while being very much its own thing -- Jeff Vandermeer Slate The Librarian is savagely satirical in the best Russian tradition. It is a vital addition to our list of outstanding books about books The Bay
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