Dimitré Dinev & Wladigeroff Brothers

**Time of the Brave**

The new epic by the Bulgarian-Austrian writer has, shortly after its release, made it onto the shortlist for the Austrian Book Prize. "Time of the Brave" - about the history of Europe and the central questions of human coexistence: a literary masterpiece of humanism and empathy.

"While I write, a candle burns on my desk. A lot burns while I write: my eyes, my soul, a cigarette. I drink coffee and keep looking at the movements of the smoke rising up to my literary gods. When I write, it’s always about everything, about heaven and earth, about everything that makes us human, about everything that literature can achieve. I don’t sit at the table for less. Only one fear always accompanies me: the fear that I have forgotten a burning candle somewhere." - Dimitré Dinev on his work on *Time of the Brave*.

A time of the brave had begun, for one had to be brave everywhere: on the streets, in parks, on playgrounds, in public transport, during the day, but especially when the sun went down.

When the maid Eva wants to end her life in the Danube on the eve of World War I, she is instead swept into the arms of the young infantry lieutenant Alois Kozusnik. Instead of her life, she loses her innocence. This is the starting point of an epic story that consists of three major narrative threads and continues into the present day. What makes a person? How does one endure and survive years of oppression and violence? How does one manage to draw strength, to hope, and to love time and again?

In his new grand novel, Dimitré Dinev explores the history of Europe and the central questions of human coexistence, creating a literary masterpiece of humanism and empathy.

In early September, his long-awaited second novel, *Time of the Brave*, was published. In over 1000 pages, the author explores the history of Europe and delves into the lives of four generations of a family between Austria and Bulgaria. Dimitré Dinev spent 13 years writing his opus magnum, and more than once during that time he doubted whether he would be able to bring his project to completion. Shortly after its release, the novel made it onto the shortlist for the Austrian Book Prize.

Dimitré Dinev was born in Bulgaria in 1968. In 1990, he came to Austria as a refugee, where he studied and has since published screenplays, stories, and essays in German. His plays have been staged, among others, at the Burgtheater. He achieved literary breakthrough in 2003 with his family novel *Engelszungen*, which was received with great interest across Europe. He spent the last thirteen years writing his new novel *Time of the Brave*. Dimitré Dinev lives in Vienna.

"I laughed and cried while reading, I marveled at the wisdom of some sentences and was delighted by the sensual precision of his language; I could only admire how he mirrors the abysses of history and the defiance of the human soul. Dimitré Dinev is a wonderful storyteller, a miracle of a storyteller!" (Robert Menasse)

"Once you find yourself in Dinev's world, you are reluctant to leave it." (Frankfurter Rundschau)

"A novel full of suffering and joy, full of tenderness and brutality. A homage - and perhaps also an appeal - to the possibility of preserving humanity even in impossible times." (Die Presse)

Dimitré Dinev: *Time of the Brave*, Kein&Aber, 2025.