Evil Granny or a story that could have been about any of us!
And let's start with the author, because this woman is a real treat. Ditta Kůtová was born in 1965, she paints, illustrates, writes, raises animals, grows fruit, farms, raised three children and now has two grandchildren.
In short – a woman…
who has experienced enough to know what she is writing about. She illustrated children's books, illustrated her own mother's fairy tales, drew for the Vyšehrad publishing house. But the novel Evil Granny is different. It's personal. It's based on her real family history—and you can physically feel that in the text. You can't write that from the table; you write it from the gut.
What is it really about?
The whole family knows her as the „evil grandmother“. Children avoid her, grandchildren are afraid, adults whisper about her. But Ditta Kůtová asks: what was her real story? And with that question, she takes you on a journey to the South Bohemian countryside at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, to the villages of Ločenice and Svatý Jan nad Malší – places with heavy air, hard soil and even harder fates.
The heroine grows up without a mother, with only a father. She falls in love, gets married – and then comes what every woman knows, who in her youth dreamed of something about life and then discovered that reality has its own plans. Years of uncertainty. Dramatic twists. Everyday hard work that knows no weekends or holidays. And behind all that – deep inner wounds that manifest themselves in her face as hardness, inaccessibility, coldness.
Because sometimes, when it hurts too much, one simply closes. And those around him read it as malice.
The story is colorful, earthy, lively – don't expect a hygienically edited historical drama in lace collars. Expect dust, sweat, disappointment and moments, even moments when the story grabs your throat before you can object. And the South Bohemian landscape is not just a backdrop – it is a full-fledged character who holds the entire story in his palm.
Why read "The Evil Granny"? And why now?
Because you, ladies in your fifties, have exactly the right perspective on this. You've been through enough life to understand why a woman shuts down. Why she defends herself instead of embracing. Why she puts on armor rather than showing where it hurts.
This book is not about an "evil grandmother" - it's about what a world that didn't ask her what she wanted from the beginning does to a woman.
And then there's another reason. You may have your own "evil grandmother" - in your memories, in your family history, maybe even in your own mirror during difficult times.
This book will offer you what you are truly missing: understanding without apology, compassion without sentimentality. That is a rare combination.
The novel is written the way people talk over coffee – directly, cordially, without unnecessary embellishments. You will read it quickly, but you will not forget it soon. And it is exactly the book you will reach for when you feel like a story with a soul.
„"Don't do to anyone what bothers you, understand?"“ — Evil Granny, Ditta Kůtová
With love, Daniela
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