A large, ambitious work about the lives of outcasts in modern Japan and such troubling themes as ecological destruction, old age, violence and nuclear war

Abe's depiction of the deadly game of survival is hilarious but at the same time leaves us with a chilling sense of apprehension about the brave new world that awaits us

As is true of Poe and Kafka - two writers whose influence does seem apparent - Abe creates on the page an unexpected impulsion. One continues reading, on and on

A dazzling prequel… His descriptions of battle in an industrial age are some of the most vivid ever written… Stalingrad is Life and Fate’s equal. It is, arguable, the richer book – shot through with human stories and a sense of life’s beauty and fragility

Few works of literature since Homer can match the piercing, unshakably humane gaze that Grossman turns on the haggard face of war

‘How wonderful to see Grossman’s vision finally come to life. A masterwork told with devastating detail, humour, and profound insights into the essence of truth. I was riveted’

The almost polyphonic breadth and rich nuance of Grossman’s prose is perfectly captured by Chandler’s translation, accomplished with his wife Elizabeth. At close on 1,000 pages, it’s a monumental achievement

[Grossman’s] characters witness, suffer and reflect with a hyper-real intensity. It illuminates nearly every page like the hellish glow that lights up the night sky over Stalingrad

Stalingrad… teems with love, devotion and wonderful flashes of humour. Sometimes all three arrive at once… but the most indelible passages arrive during the battle itself. The blow-by-blow accounts of young men willing to die to gain enough time for reinforcements to arrive from the east bank of the Volga are positively Homeric

An amazing achievement of translation and scholarship. It’s lucid and readable, with moment of wonderfully evocative prose… an astonishing example of the compromises between creativity and censorship

[Grossman’s] faith in common decency and kindness as the best antidote to totalitarian tyrannies blows like a gale through the book

Grossman’s most humane writing about injustice and atrocity paradoxically emerges from his own didactic Socialist Realist style. His desire to connect individual lives with the great flow of history transformed itself in an ability to speak for individuals lost and destroyed in the flow… Even now, Vasily Grossman remains a stepson of the time

Rare is the book that weighs the same as an artillery shell, rarer still one that weighs on the conscience as if a moral obligation. Stalingrad does that… This is a book to be absorbed over the course of a life, read and re-read from new perspectives… Each reading of Stalingrad would represent a movement closer to its elusive core, to its heart that keeps on beating through time

Stalingrad has been beautifully translated by Robert and Elizabeth Chandler, and lovingly pieced together, with the censored passages restored. Anybody who knows and admires Life and Fate would enjoy it (many of the same characters reappear)… It is a powerful war book

Compelling… [and] extraordinary storytelling… The English translation is an epic in itself… the story of the publication process sheds new light on how the typescript became almost as much of a battleground as the streets of Stalingrad. It gives a clear insight into the nature of Soviet political pressure, and of Grossman’s bravery… It’s a pleasure, albeit a bleak one, to see more of his brave work at last being rediscovered and published today, and his truth told

More than a novel, more than a history, more than graphic imagery, Stalingrad is written with an acute insight into the relationships of people caught up in the momentous tectonic shifts of history. A truly symphonic work… Robert and Elizabeth Chandler’s superb translation and editing…captures Grossman’s poetic intensity, bringing home the pain and the pity of a dying city

A gloriously written book

The novel in this new, uncensored version does constantly what the best journalism does, which is to offer us significant details and show how they form part of a larger story… [a] wonderful novel… The translation that the Chandlers have put together is a masterpiece of empathy, a true mirror of the values that Grossman consistently champions over the course of Stalingrad… an engrossing, coherent and deeply moving work of art… a truly remarkable achievement

An argument to read him not only as a fervent critic of totalitarianism, but as a deeply compassionate writer with an extraordinary gift for portraying psychological complexity and sensory detail

A gripping panorama of the human experience

This first English version of Stalingrad is a triumph on many levels… [Stalingrad] captures a definitive moment… [and Grossman] delivers an enduring tribute to the power of human spirit

A seething fresco of combat, domestic routine under siege and intellectual debate, it confirms that Grossman was the supreme bard of the second world war

To read Stalingrad is to be immersed in a world where everything is in flux… The reader emerges from his pages exhausted and chastened, but hugely enriched… the translators have done a superb job. If you haven’t read Life and Fate, it would pay to read Stalingrad first and prepare for the marathon of both volume; if you have, Stalingrad is an essential companion’

A powerful account of families torn apart by probably the bloodiest campaign in history

The best thing Salman Rushdie has written in years... One of the richest and most exuberant books he has given us.

Rushdie's creation is vivid, compelling, and entirely his own.

Salman Rushdie is a genius and I wish he could read me a story - or a chapter of his book - every night before bed. The scale and scope of his intellect and his imagination is googolplex.

It does not resemble any other novel I could name. A major accomplishment by one of our greatest living writers.

No one, and I mean no one, can bring an entire world to life... like Salman Rushdie.

Mesmerising and soul-stirring. Victory City is an epic tribute to the power of words as well as the resilience of women. Rushdie is without a peer in proving that literature soars above tyranny and bigotry, and imagination roars louder than censorship

This is Salman Rushdie at his most virtuosic.

It will show you the adult world in a whole new light. Only a master storyteller can do that.

A storyteller who reminds that death may take away a lot of things, but never the power of our words.

A capacious and sweeping telling in which writing about the past is a way of also staring dead on at the present.

Victory City stands out as one of the year's literary highlights... that feels like an instant classic.

Rushdie is an assured storyteller at the height of his powers, revealing once again how important India is as a fount of his imagination.

Victory City is one of Rushdie's very best novels. It is also a luminous, italicised, vibrant reminder of the possibilities of free expression and of the untrammelled imagination. In this instance, the medium is indeed the message.

Victory City can, in many ways, be read as an entertaining jaunt through Indian history, though it is history through the kaleidoscopic and sweeping lens of a fairy tale... this brilliantly magical tale.

This sweeping, intricately crafted fairy tale is underscored by very human characters and Rushdie's signature wit.

A grand entertainment, in a tale with many strands, by an ascended master of modern legends.

Rushdie's magical style unfurls wonders.

Rushdie's Victory City is another fabulous novel set in his native India... He's a master who never forgets that the main goal of a storyteller is to entertain rather than educate or pontificate.

Rushdie is, above all else...one of the most powerful defenders of story we have... Victory City is a victory for Rushdie - and for every reader who enters its gates.

Rushdie succeeds in creating a kind of incantatory prose that befits the fabulist nature of the story... he can enchant readers like few other writers.

This is a man at his full-strength, high-tar best - with his deeply humane worldview, his brilliance at set-pieces and, above all, the thrilling wildness of his imagination on irresistible display.

With its carousel of shifting politics and history, Victory City is Rushdie's most textured and triumphant wonder tale yet.

Utterly enchanting.

Rushdie's return to magic, myth, and India's ancient stories is dazzling. With mercurial prose and vivid renderings, Rushdie never loses us in Victory City's convolutions, but instead builds our trust to travail the many grand events of Pampa's imagined empire.

A rich, dramatic saga... The many moments of comedy...show Salman Rushdie's storytelling skills and his endearing sense of playfulness... the main feeling the reader gets is of a storyteller enjoying himself.

Rushdie is an expert at mixology; he's the DJ Shadow of text with references and allusions to high and low culture from Finnegans Wake to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon... a well-told tale that gets bums on seats.

There's a magical thread of storytelling running through the veins of each character we meet in this book... a joy to read.

A work of great imagination... In Victory City the power of the written word and of the storyteller remain triumphant.

Rushdie’s sheer love of fiction is irrepressible.

A wonderfully entertaining literary hybrid

Victory City is Salman Rushdie at his imaginative best… sweeping the reader on a journey that feels epic in a mere 320 pages