This slim volume made the Booker Prize Short List and that’s whyI read it with the Booker List group – it was on our schedule. I think I would likely never have even heard of it had it not been for that group.

The War of the Poor
by Eric Vuillard
2021 / 75 pages (!)
Kindle version
Rating – 9.25 / historical fiction
Mark Polizzotti (Translator)

With the Booker International Award the translator is also honored. (VERY IMPORTANT!)

And this is excellent reading if you’re interested in the history, but the Booker doesn’t have any rules about length. It would be okay with the Paris Literary Prize though, so I guess it’ll work. (LOL) .

“The English word novella derives from the Italian novella meaning a short story related to true (or apparently so) facts.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Novella

It fits that very nicely because The War of the Poor is historical fiction and it’s “related to apparently true facts.” Fortunately I was familiar with many of the names which was kind of surprising to me. The setting is Germany and Central Europe whereThomas Munzer became involved with the economic issues and the early Reformation. Munser was a fiery theologian who drew the common people to his ideas and angered the aristocracy. The result was the Great Peasant’s Revolt of 1525. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Peasants%27_War

The book is published as fiction because I believe Vuillard takes liberties with verifiable facts. Oh well, it’s a good book. It’s a kind of fiery book and although there are some reviewers on Amazon who said it took them less than an hour to read, that was not true for me because if you pause to comprehend and think about it there’s a lot of power and complexity in there. Brilliant book.