The She-Devil In The Mirror by Horacio Castellanos Moya. Translated from the Spanish by Katherine Silver. Fiction. New Directions. Trade Paperback. ISBN: 978-0-8112-18467. $14.95.
"The only writer of my generation who knows how to narrate the horror, the secret Vietnam that Latin America was for a long time."
-Roberto Bolano
This one makes my list for one simple reason: It breaks with convention.
That and it will make you laugh out loud.
With a great deal of humor and genre self-awareness, Moya constructs a sort of anit-noir crime novel. Taking the lead away from the lantern jawed square shoulder private eye he places it in the hands of a somewhat ditsy, materialistic daughter of luxury.
What makes this especially humorous is the fact that the backdrop is one of the yet fiery embers of civil war.
One can only imagine what this book would have been like to a South American reader. The pitch-perfect absurdity of situation and protagonist dots an "i" that other, supposedly more serious works have not been able to do.
With the Bolano quote floating around the back of your consciousness and the above teaser I will set you free on this evening of the Nor'easter fimbulvetr and link over to my previous review for the Phoenix.
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