A couple of years ago I spent most of the summer reading contemporary Hungarian poetry; that was the time I first came across Tóth Krisztina: I read her first two or three books of poems. I cannot really remember my feelings on them though, I know that I liked them, and thought that they were certainly worth reading. These days, or rather, in the last month I have really been into Hungarian literature, prose - novels and short stories - to be exact. This is how I bumped into Tóth Krisztina's second collection of short stories/essays, and I am really glad I did!
Tóth Krisztina writes beautifully, those utterly popular (god only knows why??) metro-writers who top the bestseller charts have nothing on her, nothing at all. Most of her stories are set on the streets of Budapest and on the public transportation of the city - I guess that's where she found and picked up most of her ideas, and that's why her stories are so down to earth, so easy to imagine, and somewhat familiar; yet, there's also a certain uniqueness to them that stops you and makes you think for a minute. The stories are utterly diverse: some of them will make you smile, or even laugh out loud, some of them will upset you, or even make you cry, some of them will warm your heart, but non of them will leave you behind without feeling something.
This is pretty much the best book I have read lately (Ever since Lolita, maybe? Nope, Asszony a fronton was also really great.), I will re-read it several times, without a doubt! This time I loaned it from the library; I will probably read it again before returning it, but I must also have my very own copy of Hazaviszlek, jó? on my bookshelf, so sooner or later I will purchase the bo and take it home. And not (just) because that's what the title sugggests me to do.
I really liked her poetry, too, e.g. Őszi kabátlobogás and Porhó. I really like her language, which feels like melting in the mouth.
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