Author Georgi Gospodinov’s major concern in Time Shelter  is the morality of artificially returning people to the past, and the broader question of whether this truly brings solace—whether indulgence in nostalgia is curative or pernicious.

Gospodinov’s narrator follows a geriatric psychiatrist named Gaustine as he opens clinics across Europe that help dementia patients by meticulously reproducing historical spaces so they may get “in sync with their internal time,” and “re-member” the parts of themselves that have become “dis-membered.” Soon the clinics become wildly popular as a cure for not just dementia, but for contemporary anomie and angst.

Unfortunately, the remembrances can also stir up old hostilities, as well, and a misbegotten re-enactment of Franz Ferdinand’s assassination brings the continent to the brink of a “second First World War.”

Time Shelter won the International Booker Award for 2023.