Richard Schuberth reads from his new novel “Der Paketzusteller” (The Parcel Delivery Man), another installment in his Comédie humaine, which this time shifts between digital and analog society. A wickedly frivolous tour de force through Vienna and the internet, with plenty of wit, LSD, and linguistic imagination.

Gerhild Pfister, 48, is the queen of Facebook. And not a particularly nice person. As the head of her digital salon and a feared online satirist, the failed artist propagates total social media existence. But Gerhild has cancer and will soon die. Knowing that Facebook will not erect a monument to her, she stirs up as much digital dust as possible one last time—punishing, rewarding, empowering, castrating. However, an unexpected love affair with the parcel delivery man Haydar brings her life crashing down to analog reality and shakes her “sovereignty over death,” which she has stabilized with the help of all kinds of psychotropic drugs. When Haydar disappears and evidence mounts that he was murdered by his boss, she seeks revenge. But her revenge fails, which, contrary to her expectations, leads to a new career for her and a turbulent and unusual showdown for the novel...