Nataliya Deleva

Arrival is an exploration of the ripple effects of domestic abuse. The story follows a young woman fleeing her home country and trying to rebuild her life, after she has suffered violence at the hands of an alcoholic father. Prompted by her therapist, the unnamed protagonist starts processing the abuse experienced in her childhood while also pondering what it means to be a mother when consumed by trauma. The novel bends form to accommodate the narrator’s scattered mind and her attempt to assemble a version of herself through fragments and stitches of memories, borrowed conversations and minutiae that linger and haunt. Infused with love and determination and interwoven with folk tales and rituals, Arrival depicts the ways in which we are resilient, capable of carving our own paths and reimagining our lives. Praise ‘I read Arrival in one rapt gulp, urged on by its unnamed narrator’s need to flee her past, escape the confines of womanhood, and the stains of shame and guilt that keep repeating on her, like heartburn. The novel deals in life’s hard knocks, in trauma and deracination, but in langauge that is sensual, languid, feline, snaking with double meaning and sly humour. Like an Sigrid Nunez novel, Arrival seems to be about everything, its canvas expanding and contracting, allowing the story’s particulars to echo far and wide.’ Marina Benjamin, author of Insomnia ‘A powerful tale about love, domestic violence, motherhood, escape, and arrival on many levels, written with sensuality and poetic force.’ Naja Marie-Aidt, author of Baboon, Rock, Paper, Scissors and Carl’s Book ‘From the opening of Arrival, Nataliya Deleva demonstrates a remarkable talent for conjuring place and moment. It sits the reader beside her unnamed narrator. Whether in the Bulgarian valleys of her childhood or inhabiting the trauma-induced void that’s replaced any semblance of home, we are beside her.’ Harriet Mercer, author of Gargoyles ‘Arrival is a book made up of fragments – fragments of love, motherhood, abuse and marriage – which form an intriguing and moving kaleidoscope narrative. A jagged, beautifully written novel which explores the shattering impact of abuse and how the past shapes the present.’ Sam Mills, author of The Fragments of My Father ‘In her powerful second novel Nataliya Deleva explores the legacy of a childhood scarred by domestic abuse: how the confusion of love with pain creeps into every fragmented shard of adult life, contaminating relationships and complicating motherhood. Through the mythical samodivi she conjures an enduring archetype of the wild rebel female who has escaped, who rejects the ways men control women. There is beauty and tenderness in the creation of her unnamed narrator’s new life, in the poetry of survival and renewal, and in the breaking of patterns for her daughter – freedom from shattering cruelty.’ Venetia Welby, author of Dreamtime ‘Arrival is a story of growth and healing, an unflinching look at the aftermath of growing up in systemic domestic violence. Deleva immerses us into the narrator’s journey of entering motherhood while simultaneously understanding, healing and rebuilding her life. The devastating memories of a lost childhood will not leave the readers unmoved. It hurts to read this book, yet it gives us hope for the resilience of the human spirit. ‘ Katerina Stoykova, author of Second Skin

Giving voice to people living on the periphery in post-communist Bulgaria, Four Minutes centers around Leah, an orphan who suffered daily horrors growing up, and now struggles to integrate into society as a gay woman. She confronts her trauma by trying to volunteer at the orphanage, and to adopt a young girl—a choice that is frustrated over and over by bureaucracy and the pervasive stigma against gay women. In addition to Leah’s narrative, the novel contains nine other standalone character studies of other frequently ignored voices. These sections are each meant to be read in approximately four minutes, a nod to a social experiment that put forth the hypothesis that it only takes four minutes of looking someone in the eye and listening to them in order to accept and empathize with them. A meticulously crafted social novel, Four Minutes takes a difficult, uncompromising look at modern life in Eastern Europe.