Un
trabajo abrasador e hipnotico; sorprendente historia de encantamiento y
desilusion. -Laura Esquivel, autora del bestseller Como agua para
chocolate.
Aridjis es muy habil al conjurar ese embeleso adolescente que captura el
significado debajo de cada superficie. Como la escritura de Sebald o Cusk, la
suya ronda sus propias omisiones… La imagen del naufragio se avecina
amenazante para Aridjis; se convierte en una lente muy util para ver este
libro autonomo, inescrutable y extranamente cautivador como un objeto
rescatado que quiere volver al mar. -Katy Waldman, The New Yorker
Una tarde
de otono en la Ciudad de Mexico, Luisa, de diecisiete anos, no regresa a
casa. En su lugar, aborda un camion a la costa del Pacifico con Tomas, un muchacho
al que apenas conoce. El parece representar todo lo que le falta a su vida:
temeridad, impulso e independencia. Y Tomas tambien puede ayudarla a
satisfacer una extrana obsesion: encontrar a la compania de enanos
ucranianos. Segun los reportes del periodico, los enanos escaparon
recientemente de un circo sovietico durante una gira por Mexico. Los
imaginados destinos de estos artistas circenses llenan los surrealistas
suenos de Luisa cuando se instala en una comunidad playera de Oaxaca. Rodeada
de hippies, nudistas, buscadores de tesoros y excentricos contadores de
historias, ella busca a alguien, a quien sea, que le prometa que sin
importar nada, seguira siendo un misterio.
Todo esto es una mision mas facil
de imaginar que de lograr. Mientras pasea por la orilla del mar y visita el
bar local, Luisa comienza a desaparecer peligrosamente de las vidas de los
desconocidos de Zipolite, la Playa de los muertos.
ENGLISH DESCRIPTION
Aridjis
is deft at conjuring the teenage swooniness that apprehends meaning below
every surface. Like Sebald’s or Cusk’s, her haunted writing patrols its own
omissions … The figure of the shipwreck looms large for Aridjis. It
becomes a useful lens through which to see this book, which is
self-contained, inscrutable, and weirdly captivating, like a salvaged object
that wants to return to the sea.
Katy Waldman, The New Yorker
One autumn afternoon in Mexico City, seventeen-year-old Luisa does not
return home from school. Instead, she boards a bus to the Pacific coast with
Tomas, a boy she barely knows. He seems to represent everything her life is
lacking recklessness, impulse, independence.
Tomas may also help Luisa fulfill an unusual obsession: she wants to track
down a traveling troupe of Ukrainian dwarfs. According to newspaper reports,
the dwarfs recently escaped a Soviet circus touring Mexico. The imagined
fates of these performers fill Luisa’s surreal dreams as she settles in a
beach community in Oaxaca. Surrounded by hippies, nudists, beachcombers, and
eccentric storytellers, Luisa searches for someone, anyone, who will
promise, no matter what, to remain a mystery. It is a quest more easily
envisioned than accomplished. As she wanders the shoreline and visits the
local bar, Luisa begins to disappear dangerously into the lives of strangers
on Zipolite, the Beach of the Dead.
Meanwhile, her father has set out to find his missing daughter. A mesmeric
portrait of transgression and disenchantment unfolds. Sea Monsters is a
brilliantly playful and supple novel about the moments and mysteries that
shape us.
