Die Hauptstadt

A satirical and critical look at the EU, centered around a range of European characters crossing paths in Brussels, each participating in the bureaucratic melting pot that is the European commission. Menasse's writing is very cheeky at times, has deadpan humor (there's a pig on the loose in the streets of Brussels!) but also digs deep into Europe's history and the reasons for the EC's original foundation (no! more! nationalism!).

I enjoyed some of the narrative strands more than others, and was actually quite surprised when at the end they weren't neatly tied up, and rather were just left hanging. But there definitely was a lot of ‘schmunzeln' at the clever picking-apart and mocking of politicians, lobbyists, academics and all the other bureaucrats.