The Paper Man
A deeply moving interwar romance set between 1930s Austria and 1980s Ireland, based on a real-life unsolved mystery.
1930s Austria. Vienna is a bustling, cosmopolitan city on the brink of war. Matthias Sindelar is an internationally renowned soccer player known as "The Paper Man" because of his because of his effortless weave across the field. When Sindelar speaks out against Hitler, his fame can't protect him from being placed under Gestapo surveillance. Meanwhile, Sindelar falls in love with a young Jewish girl named Rebekah. As the atmosphere in Vienna darkens under the Nazi regime, Rebekah flees to relatives in Cork, Ireland. Only after she arrives there does she realize she is pregnant with Sindelar's child. The following year, at the age of 35, The Paper Man is found dead in his apartment.1980s Ireland. In the Jewish Quarter of Cork, Rebekah's son Jack Shine discovers a bundle of German letters and newspaper clippings tied with a ribbon while sorting his mother's belongings. With the help of his German-speaking father-in-law, Jack translates the letters and attempts to piece together his family history and, hopefully, solve the mystery of his father's identity. Based on real people and true events, The Paper Man is the story of twentieth-century Europe, the Holocaust, the cost of fame, and love against the odds.
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Billy O'Callaghan is the award-winning author of four short story collections and four novels. A lifelong soccer fanatic, he was intrigued by the life of Matthias Sindelar, superstar of the great 1930s Austrian team. The mysterious and sinister nature of Sindelar's death drew O'Callaghan to Vienna where he traced Sindelar's footsteps and visited his grave. From there, he slowly developed the story that became The Paper Man. Winner of the Irish Book Award, and finalist for the Royal Society of Literature's Encore Award and COSTA Short Story Award, among other honors, O'Callaghan's work has been translated into many languages. His short stories have appeared in magazines around the world. His most recent novel, Life Sentences, was published by Godine in 2022. O'Callaghan was born in the village of Douglas, Ireland, where he still lives.
"History's inherited burden presses firmly on the characters in Billy O'Callaghan's The Paper Man in which the discovery of a hidden cache of love letters pries open the secret past of a long-dead Austrian immigrant....O'Callaghan moves his narrative deftly between the Vienna of the Anschluss, rural Austria before the Nazi takeover and early 1980s Ireland, where Jack is stunned to learn that his father was a bona fide hero, captain of the Austrian national soccer team, 'the game's maestro, ' who retired rather than play for the conquering Germans."
--The New York Times
--Christian Science Monitor "Irish author O'Callaghan (Life Sentences) brings to life 1930s Austria and 1980s Ireland in this mesmerizing tale of love, soccer, and family secrets....O'Callaghan's storytelling is magnetic." --Publishers Weekly, starred review
"In O'Callaghan's haunting historical novel, decades-old wartime secrets are revealed. The poignant and passionate The Paper Man covers lost love, anguished lives, and the discovery of an enduring heritage." --Foreword Reviews
Praise for Billy O'Callaghan's previous novel, Life Sentences "Billy O'Callaghan uses a trio of voices in his poignant novel Life Sentences as three generations of an Irish family probe a legacy of poverty and war. ....powerful."
--The New York Times
"O'Callaghan has done a brilliant job of capturing the ethos of the Irish setting as we see it through the beautifully created lives of his characters, who are extraordinary, as is this timeless book about them."
--Booklist (starred review) "O'Callaghan writes with a bright, enlivening emotional palette and a penetrating eye for the details of family history. A deeply felt and distinctive work by a real craftsman."
--Kirkus (starred review)
