My last review of 2012 over at Necessary Fiction is an appropriate one as I take a look at the most recent edition of Dalkey Archive’s Best European Fiction project:

One of the defining elements of Dalkey Archive’s Best European Fiction project is the impossibility of gathering these assorted fictions under a single stylistic or thematic roof. And the most recent offering—the fourth of the series and the last edited by Aleksandar Hemon—is no different; the Best European Fiction 2013 is a mix of aesthetics and styles, a jumble of voices and settings and genres and perspectives, the stories as different from each other as are the 32 different countries and 28 different languages that this lengthy collection includes.

Anyone interested in translated literature, in voices that are almost never represented in traditional American publishing—at least not in such diversity or sheer number—will really enjoy this anthology. It’s a collection to take slowly—a story a week, a story a day. Whatever your pace. But these are unique little fictions and a glimpse at how contemporary literature is evolving on the European end of things.

You can read the entire review here.