New Latin American Books

NPR highlighted three new Latin American books under Latin American literature in translation: Stories that take you to unexpected places:

Juan Emar, a cult-favorite Chilean writer from the early 20th century who was loathed by critics and readers alike in his lifetime, sends the characters of his novel Yesterday racing from one surreal surprise to the next. He makes comedy of readers' efforts to guess what might be coming, or to figure out what any of it means. Cristina Rivera Garza, a Mexican writer and MacArthur genius grant winner, writes stories that help her "share the unintelligible," as she puts it in the introduction to her New and Selected Stories, which spans over 30 years of her career. And the Ecuadorian writer and publisher Gabriela Alemán, whose Family Album is by far the most traditionally written of these three books, plays with tropes ranging from the Robinson Crusoe story to the classic betrayed-wife setup to wrestle with the impossible-to-decode oddness of human life, which old stories can only hide for so long.

The reviews ensue. More books I do not have time to read!

sch 5/27/22