Cooking in the Wrong Century

'Very funny, very stylish and very moving' ADAM THIRLWELL

'An irresistible novel - I loved it' CLAIRE POWELL

'Deliciously unsettling and thoroughly enjoyable' AYŞEGÜL SAVAS

An evening of perfect preparation. A night of uninvited chaos.

For the hostess, food has always been about growing up. From the pancakes your grandmother made you, dolloped with jam, to the salty glug of your first oyster. Now, poised at the brink of midlife, the hostess prepares for a dinner party in her new apartment. With a hunger for the finer things in life, she folds linen napkins into neat triangles, arranges wildflowers for the table and puts on a jazz playlist the projects effortless cool.

But her composure begins to falter when her guests arrive drunk and late, downing bottles of her perfectly cooled wine and trailing water over the floor. Here comes the chain-smoking professor who never says the right thing, the husband glued to his smartphone, the wife who makes a secret pass at your boyfriend.

As small talk and social preening give way to sexual tension and lost inhibitions, the hostess struggles to maintain control over an evening far beyond her wildest imaginings.



Teresa Präauer is a prize-winning Austrian author, essayist and playwright. Having studied German Literature and Language in Austria and Germany, she received a Master's Degree in Philosophy and in Fine Arts. She is a literary columnist for German newspapers and magazines, and lectures at universities internationally. Most recently, Teresa Präauer was selected to be writer-in-residence at Deutsches Haus at New York University. She is a member of the Berlin Academy of Arts and the recipient of numerous awards for her books, including the 2017 Erich Fried Prize and the 2022 Ben Witter Prize. Cooking in the Wrong Century is her first novel to be translated into English and won the highly prestigious 2024 Bremer Literaturpreis.