Egon shuns this, instead spending his days bothering his friends and a string of lovers for food, beer, sex, and shelter, something he finds remarkably easy on account of his good looks and charm.

He funds what he feels absolutely necessary through writing trashy romances under a pseudonym – whether he has higher literary ambitions is unclear.

Meanwhile, a friend of his at the foundry is slowly losing his mind to an obsession with a film-star, and relationships Egon had always depended on are falling apart, only to be replaced by new & volatile ones.

The book’s final chapters are a mess of consequences, as grim as they are hilarious, and indicative of nation undergoing radical change In 1991 TV Slovenia made a film based upon the novel - Cartier Project.

[1] First American edition was published in 2004 by Scala House press under the title The Cartier Project.