From the Man Booker International Prize winner comes a story of the great city of Gjirokaster and of a secret meeting that may have changed the face of Europe in the twentieth century

Shortlisted for the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize 2013.

In September 1943, Nazi troops advance on the ancient gates of Gjirokastër, Albania. The very next day, the Germans vanish without a trace. As the townsfolk wonder if they might have dreamt the events of the previous night, rumours circulate of a childhood friendship between a local dignitary and the invading Nazi Colonel, a reunion in the town square and a fateful dinner party that would transform twentieth-century Europe.

A captivating novel of resistance in a dictatorship, and steeped in Albanian folklore, The Fall of the Stone City shows Kadare at the height of his powers.