Gjak

Gjak

by Dimosthenis Papamarkos

£12.99

Pre-order for delivery on publication (27th October 2026) or subscribe to receive it early.

Greece, a hundred years ago: in the aftermath of the Greco-Turkish War, young men return from the battlefield, forever changed by what they have seen and done. They come home seeking revenge or forgiveness; all of them grieving. They might have survived the war, but peace does not come easily. The men are marked. These are their stories.

Hailed as the most important Greek novel of the twenty-first century, Gjak unfolds in an unnamed Arvanite village – a closed rural community governed by its own codes of honour. Binding each soldier’s story is the red thread of gjak itself: an Arvanitic word meaning blood, bloodline, blood feud, and nation. With this thread, these interconnected tales are woven into one powerful, haunting portrait of a world in violent transition.

Translated from the Greek by Siân Valvis

148pp, paperback with flaps, £12.99
ISBN: 978-1-916806-24-5
Publication date: 27 October 2026

Press & Reviews

‘What a brilliant little book...The nine bruising, bloodstained monologues of Gjak – already acknowledged as a modern masterwork of fiction in Greece – surely must, in this magnetically authentic and colloquial translation, be read and honoured far more widely. I can’t remember the last time I wished greater success for a book. For its enduring relevance. For its unnerving blend of tenderness and brutality. For its rueful and unflinching honesty. For simply being unignorable. It ought to be on the front table of every bookstore.’
– Jim Crace

‘Riveting.’
– Yorgos Lanthimos

'Gjak has hit the literary scene like a meteorite.'
– Alexandros Stergiopoulos, writer and critic

'Whether it’s thanks to critical acclaim or simply word of mouth—either way, everyone’s talking about Gjak.'
– Marilena Astrapellou,The Tribune

About The Book

Author

Dimosthenis Papamarkos was born in 1983 in Malessina, Greece. Widely regarded as one of the main voices of his generation, Papamarkos has published novels, short fiction, plays, screenplays, poetry and graphic novels. As artist in residence at the Onassis Foundation in 2020, he wrote the play Στον Κόρακα (A Murder of Crows). Gjak received the prestigious Academy of Athens award, among others, and has been successfully adapted for the stage by three of Greece’s most prominent theatre companies.

Translator

Siân Valvis is a British-Greek literary translator working from Greek, Russian, French and Portuguese. She was the recipient of the National Centre for Writing’s Emerging Translator Mentorship in 2020. Her first book, the transadaptation Kolobok (Fontanka, 2021), won a PEN Translates award. Valvis’s work has since been shortlisted for the John Dryden Prize and the AAWP Translation Prize. She is currently based in Sao Paulo.

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