It turns out that it’s not only the UK government that is doing a bad job with their Brexit mission. I have also been somewhat neglectful of my duties as reader, reviewer and curator of the #EU27Project in 2018. Nevertheless, I’m delighted to say that some wonderful bloggers have been linking to the page even without my prodding, reminding and thanking them.
Just to remind you all, because it’s been such a long time that I may even have some new readers on my blog, this is the plan to read books from all the 27 countries that will continue to remain in the EU after the UK pulls out. Read, review, link. That is it. Multiple entries from the same country are accepted (even the norm). But ideally I would love to have at least one representative from those harder to reach/ not so much translated countries that make up the EU.
So I am very pleased to observe that we now have over 100 entries (there are a few duplicate entries and a lost Norwegian trying desperately to join the EU).

Some countries are over-represented – and that’s probably true when it comes to translation and publication. It should come as no surprise that Germany (19) and France (16) are the top runners, but you may be surprised to hear that Austria is punching well above its weight in terms of population (10). That probably has something to do with Lizzy and Caroline’s wonderful initiative of German Literature Month, which is about literature written in the German language rather than just the one produced in Germany.
Other small countries (or sparsely populated ones) that have done well are The Netherlands (7) and Finland (6). It’s somewhat surprising that Ireland hasn’t done better (6), given that there are no translation issues and so many of the great writers of the English tongue are in fact Irish. I also expected Italy (6) and Spain (5) to do better, given their vast literary tradition and what seems to be a respectable amount of translation into English.
If this had been a crime fiction community, I suspect that Sweden would have done far, far better, but it’s only had one review so far! In contrast, teensy Denmark and Belgium have had 4 each. Of the more recent EU members, Poland leads the way with just 3, while Czechia, Croatia and Latvia have 2 each.
Notable absences from this list: Hungary (although I did do a vlog which included the first volume of Miklos Banffy’s Transylvanian trilogy), Romania (because I was too picky about which book should represent my home country) and Greece – oddly, three of the countries I know best. from the EU. I have a couple of reviews to upload for Estonia and Croatia And I’m still struggling to find anything from Cyprus, Malta or Luxembourg. So I’d be especially grateful for any reviews that you might have reflecting all the countries in this paragraph!
Sincerely hoping that you will take part too if you read any books from any of the #EU27 countries between now and the end of March, I will leave you with this map of all the traditional Christmas sweets from Europe. (Not all of them are 100% correct, nor are they all EU, but we’re all about approximations for now!) Happy Holidays!
