You Glow In The Dark

DO YOU GLOW IN THE DARK? In Liliana Colanzi’s singular collection of short stories, set in a Latin America at once real and otherworldly, human vice contaminates every page. Amid eerie near-future landscapes, in communities both ordinary and uncanny, and during the very real fallout of a nuclear disaster, Colanzi’s characters must contend with a poisoned legacy. Unpredictable and vivid, You Glow in the Dark radiates in the reader’s mind long after the final page and announces a daring new voice in fiction.

DO YOU GLOW IN THE DARK? In Liliana Colanzi’s singular collection of short stories, set in a Latin America at once real and otherworldly, human vice contaminates every page. Amid eerie near-future landscapes, in communities both ordinary and uncanny, and during the very real fallout of a nuclear disaster, Colanzi’s characters must contend with a poisoned legacy. Unpredictable and vivid, You Glow in the Dark radiates in the reader’s mind long after the final page and announces a daring new voice in fiction.

The seven stories of You Glow in the Dark unfold in a Latin America wrecked and poisoned by human greed, and yet Colanzi's writing-at once sleek and dense, otherworldly and intensely specific-casts an eerily bright spell over the wreckage. Some stories seem to be set in a near future; all are superbly executed and yet hard to pin down; they often leave the reader wondering: Was that realistic or fantastic? Colanzi draws power from zombie movies just as much as from classic horror writers, and this daring is matched by her energizing simultaneous use of multiplicity and fragmentation-the book's stylistic trademarks. Freely mixing worlds, she uses the Bolivian altiplano as the backdrop for an urban dystopia and blends Aymara with Spanish. Colanzi never gets bogged down; she can be brutal and direct or light-handed and subtle. Her materials are dark, but always there's the lift of her vivid sense of humor. You Glow in the Dark seizes the reader's attention (from the title on) and holds it: this is a book that announces the arrival of a major new talent.

The seven stories of You Glow in the Dark unfold in a Latin America wrecked and poisoned by human greed, and yet Colanzi's writing-at once sleek and dense, otherworldly and intensely specific-casts an eerily bright spell over the wreckage. Some stories seem to be set in a near future; all are superbly executed and yet hard to pin down; they often leave the reader wondering: Was that realistic or fantastic? Colanzi draws power from zombie movies just as much as from classic horror writers, and this daring is matched by her energizing simultaneous use of multiplicity and fragmentation-the book's stylistic trademarks. Freely mixing worlds, she uses the Bolivian altiplano as the backdrop for an urban dystopia and blends Aymara with Spanish. Colanzi never gets bogged down; she can be brutal and direct or light-handed and subtle. Her materials are dark, but always there's the lift of her vivid sense of humor. You Glow in the Dark seizes the reader's attention (from the title on) and holds it: this is a book that announces the arrival of a major new talent.