Lapvona cover art

Lapvona

A dark medieval Sunday Times bestseller from the author of TikTok sensation My Year of Rest and Relaxation

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Lapvona

Written by: Ottessa Moshfegh
Narrated by: Ottessa Moshfegh
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Buy Now for ₹546.23

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About this listen

Brought to you by Penguin.

In the land of Lapvona, the lord of the land Villiam is cheating the local villagers of their food, their water, their livelihoods. Grotesque and ridiculous, he marries the pregnant and tongueless ex-nun Agata, whom he believes will make him God, and his son will be the second Christ.

It's a land of murder, cannibalism, incest and rape. Despite all of the characters' individual inadequacies and madness, you find yourself completely engrossed in each character's fate, be it Marek, Jude, Agata, Villiam, Lispeth, Ina, Father Barnabas. It's an anti-fairytale within a fairytale - maybe this is what hell on earth looks like? Is it an indictment of humanity, of religion, of grotesque despots?

An original work of brilliance - singular, funny, horrifying and entertaining in equal measure.

© Ottessa Moshfegh 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022

 Dark Humour Fairy Tales Fantasy Genre Fiction Historical Literary Fiction Literature & Fiction Medieval World Literature

Critic Reviews

Compelling... Moshfegh's bold venture beyond her comfort zone in Lapvona is a welcome promise of how much more she has to offer American literature today.
What impresses here is not so much Moshfegh's abilities with character or narrative, or even her language . . . as the qualities Lapvona shares with a Francis Bacon painting: depicting in blood-red vitality, without morals or judgment, the human animal in its native chaos.
Moshfegh expertly creates a world with its own superstitions and laws, both timeless and topical.
Moshfegh's genius is her ability to rip away the veil, revealing the horrors beneath, in writing so compelling, and bleakly funny, that we can't bear to look away.
A witty, vicious novel.. . Moshfegh is one of our most thrilling chroniclers of the abject
Booker-shortlisted Ottessa Moshfegh is likely to out-weird most things published next year - set in a medieval fiefdom, could it be a work of genius, too? (Stephanie Cross)
Deliriously quirky medieval tale . . . Moshfegh brings her trademark fascination with the grotesque to depictions of the pandemic, inequality, and governmental corruption, making them feel both uncanny and all too familiar. It's a triumph.
[A] truly unique novel.
Moshfegh writes brilliantly bizarre. Her arresting fourth novel continues this tradition.
Despite its medieval milieu, Lapvona is a quintessential Moshfegh book. It has the warped earthiness of the author's first two novels... [and] a powerful undercurrent of allegory.
All stars
Most relevant
Lapvona is an interesting novel. There are plenty of triggers here to set most people on edge. But, it was these deviances which made the book interesting.

The first 70% of the book definitely hooks you. The last 30% feels not well thought out and draggy.

Still, it is a good listen. This book felt like a commentary on the evil that all of us have hidden in our psyche. Sometimes this evil is a consequence of the life we’ve been handed down, other times it is a result of the choices we do/don’t make and the rest of the times it is something we are born with. It was also a commentary on the status of religion and how corrupt religion has become over time- misshapen and unrecognisable over the years.

A 3.5 star book.

Different, but a bit draggy

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Very akin to Robert Eggers' work. Haunting and captivating. In Lapvona, God is indeed dead.

Gruesomely fantastic.

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The story meanders through one dark turn to another. There is no respite and i kind of was hooked but alas there isn't much to it and many things remain unexplained.

Dark AF

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Meandering plot with no sense of climax. Absolute waste of a credit. Skip this one.

Incoherent mess

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