I instinctively knew I was going to like the book when I saw the title and the cover. It just felt like something I needed to read, and I’m glad that I was a hundred percent right about it! 

Litost is a collection of short or ‘sliced’ stories, as the author puts it. The thing with short stories that have deliberate indefinite endings is it can easily frustrate the reader. To satisfy yet leave the reader wanting more is a tricky balance and most writers will probably manage to get it in some stories but Samir Satam has beautifully managed to get it right in all the 12 stories in this collection. 

It’s a short and crisp book with each story as different and fresh as the previous one, all held together by ‘litost’, which according to Milan Kundera, is “a state of torment created by the sudden sight of one's own misery.” ( The title is taken from Kundera’s book, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting. )

Absolutely loved this book! It's a book I wish I could write! I can’t wait to re-read it soon. What Did We Lose, A Trespasser and Until We Meet Again are my top three stories from the book! 

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.