The Train Was on Time

The hauntingly beautiful first novel by Nobel Prize winning author Heinrich Boll

Twenty-four-year-old Andreas, a disillusioned German soldier, is travelling on a troop train to the Eastern Front when he has an awful premonition that he will die in exactly five days. As he hurtles towards his death, he reflects on the chaos around him - the naïve soldiers, the painfully thin girl who pours his coffee, the ruined countryside - with sudden, heart-breaking poignancy. Arriving in Poland the night before he is certain he will die, he meets Olina, a beautiful prostitute, and together they attempt to escape his fate...

'His work reaches the highest level of creative originality and stylistic perfection' Daily Telegraph

'Boll combines a mammoth intelligence with a literary outlook that is masterful and unique' Joseph Heller, author of Catch-22

'My most-admired contemporary novelist' John Ashbery

Primul roman ingrozitor de frumos al autorului castigator al Premiului Nobel, Heinrich Boll, Andreas, in varsta de 24 de ani, un soldat german dezamagit, calatoreste cu un tren de trupe catre Frontul de Est, cand are o presimtire ingrozitoare ca va muri exact in cinci zile. In timp ce se indreapta spre moartea sa, el reflecta asupra haosului din jurul sau - soldatii naivi, fata dureroasa si slaba care isi toarna cafeaua, peisajul rural ruinat - cu o intensitate brusca, sfasietoare.