Maja Visenjak Limon Knihy

Abandoned at birth because he has the face of a “prize boar,” the unnamed narrator of Guarding Hanna knows only a local Berlin gang as family. Patriarch Maestro acts as surrogate father, employing him to collect debts and perform thuggish tasks. Except for brief moments interacting with the gang, “the beast” spends his life alone, wandering Berlin’s streets and sleeping in its vast housing projects. This changes in a flash when one of Maestro’s sons is implicated in a crime. The only hope of saving him is to protect the sole witness, beautiful but eccentric Hanna Wyoczik. Maestro calls on “the beast” to move in with her until the trial. But never having spent more than five minutes in a social situation with any human being, much less a woman, he quickly finds the basic tasks of human interaction and social intercourse insufferable. Yet Hanna’s unfazed reaction to her guardian, and her witty account of philandering ex-husbands and a nympho mother, soon confound and captivate him. Could love be rearing its head? Miha Mazzini weaves simple scenes into a meaningful and darkly hilarious novel, relentlessly poking and prodding at the human condition without losing sight of the characters’ humanity.

Nekoč je živel Martin Krpan, močan in samosvoj človek. Ukvarjal se je s tihotapljenjem angleške soli, zaradi česar ga je oblast preganjala. Nekega zimskega dne, ko je Krpan tovoril sol na svoji kobilici, mu je prišel naproti voz, na katerem je bil sam cesar, ki pa ga Krpan ni prepoznal. Ker se je voz hitro bližal, je Krpan dvignil kobilico in jo brez težav prestavil, da je ne bi povozili. Cesarja je Krpanova moč presenetila, zato ga je ogovoril, nato pa se odpravil naprej. Leto dni po tem dogodku je po Dunaju začel razsajati strašen velikan Brdavs. Vabil je vse junake v boj, a ga nihče ni uspel premagati, ubil je vsakega premaganca, med njimi tudi cesarjevega sina. Takrat se je cesar spomnil na Krpana in ga dal poklicati. Ta se je odzval in prišel na Dunaj, kjer je s svojo močjo osramotil cesarjevo orožarno in konjušnico, saj se mu je vsako orožje, ki ga je prijel, zdrobilo v rokah. Za boj z Brdavsom je posekal najlepšo lipo na dvornem vrtu in se s tem zameril cesarici - a si nazadnje le priskrbel orožje in dal privesti z Vrha svojo kobilico, s katero sta šla nato v boj. Martin Krpan je Brdavsu z lahkoto odsekal glavo. Za nagrado je dobil dovoljenje za tovorjenje angleške soli in vrečko zlatnikov ter se zadovoljno odpravil domov.