Synopses & Reviews
Through the gaze of a young boy, Nicholas Papandreou narrates the story of a family uprooted from their home in the United States to live in Greece in pursuit of a father's political ambition.
In a delicately crafted series of vignettes that create the portrait of an unforgettable family, A Crowded Heart follows Alex as he grows under the shadow of his father, the future Prime Minister. This breathtaking first novel is set against a lusciously wrought Greek landscape, as Alex and his family move through the world of Byzantine politics and are swept up in the avalanche of revolution, military dictatorship, and exile.
Review
"Drawing on the dream-landscape that gave us Zeus and Hera, and also the House of Atreus, Nicholas Papandreou presents us with beautifully understated rites of passage."
--Christopher Hitchens
"A literary collage that is short, sweet, and poetic... in elegant, colorful prose."
--Jeremy Caplan, Boston Book Review
"Sensuous and sharp... Tom Sawyer goes to Thasos."
--Gore Vidal
"Powerful, imaginative... a universal and resonant coming-of-age story."
--Catherine Temma Davidson, San Francisco Chronicle
"From the very first page, A Crowded Heart captivates the reader... Honest and insightful."
--George Stephanopoulos
About the Author
Nicholas Papandreou, the son of former Greek Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou, was born in Berkeley, California, in 1956. He studied economics at Yale and Princeton, and literature at Vermont College of Norwich University. He now lives in Athens, Greece, and writes full time.