The Cartier Project

Title: The Cartier Project
Author: Miha Mazzini
Published: 1987, English translation in 2004 by Scala House Press
Genre: Man on a mission.
Pages: 216


The SO and I went on a trip to Ljubljana, Slovenia this August, and I bought this puppy from a cool little mostly English book shop called the Behemot. Worth checking out if you're in town! And Ljubljana itself is really worth checking out, so while you're in the neighbourhood anyway...

The Cartier Project is set in times when Slovenia was still a part of Yugoslavia. Egon writes trashy novels and bums his friends and acquaintances for beer and other bare necessities of life. His one extravagance is his Cartier perfume, and guess what, that just ran out. Perfume costs money, though, but Egon is ready to fo whatever it takes to get some. Including stealing Playboys, blackmailing friends by threatening their, ahem, vegetable patches with the police, and publishing books.

Apparently this book's very Bukowskian: I can't say since I haven't popped my Bukowski-cherry yet. But it was fun and quick, even though Millar and Led Zeppelin distracted me, and Egon was a delightfully decadent narrator.


   "Are you coming?" I shouted. Ibro was bent over looking for something on the ground.
   "Fucking hell, I lost the dice!" he shouted and went on rummaging around like a chicken in the weak light of the streetlights.
   Through my drunken brain a flash of recognition. History is a circle, not of people, but of events which are repeated over and over. What once Caesar did was now repeated by Ibro.
   "Found them," reported Ibro, out of breath. We jumped on the bus. Sat on the front seats. The driver drove off. A fresh breeze pleasantly ruffled our hair. I was sitting next to Selim, squashed against the side of the bus. His shoulders took up a seat and a half. 
   Selim lifted the beer and me through the window of the dormitory.