A selection of extracts from the prestigious MacLehose Press, an imprint specialising in the very best translated literary and crime fiction. From a hill station in the Himalayan foothills to the sweltering heat of downtown Buenos Aires; from the frozen lakes of far northern Sweden to the scarred cityscape of 1980s Beirut; from Breslau's sordid heyday to a kingdom that no longer exists. For five years the MacLehose Press has published fiction, non-fiction and crime from twenty languages - using the finest translators - alongside a distinguished few writers in English. This anthology brings together extracts from our backlist and from titles to be published in 2013. Many of these books are bestsellers in their own countries, and prizewinners of critical and popular acclaim. Romance, satire, elegy, mystery, murder, existential angst, the horrors of civil or colonial strife: if words can offer new worlds, you will find them in these pages. We invite you to sample a literary life less ordinary: