Mona

Mona
Adam Morris, Pola Oloixarac
RRP:
NZ$ 27.99
Our Price:
NZ$ 22.39
Hardback
h200 x 132mm - 192pg
3 Feb 2022 UK
International import eta 7-19 days
9781788169882
Out Of Stock
Currently no stock in-store, stock is sourced to your order
Mona, a Peruvian writer based in California, presents a tough and sardonic exterior. She likes drugs and cigarettes, and when she learns that she is something of an anthropological curiosity--a woman writer of color treasured at her university for the flourish of rarefied diversity she brings--she pokes fun at American academic culture and its fixation on identity. When she is nominated for "the most important literary award in Europe," Mona sees a chance to escape her downward spiral of sunlit substance abuse and erotic distraction, so she trades the temptations of California for a small, gray village in Sweden, close to the Arctic Circle. Now she is stuck in the company of all her jet-lagged--and mostly male--competitors, arriving from Japan, France, Armenia, Iran, and Colombia. Isolated as they are, the writers do what writers do: exchange compliments, nurse envy and private resentments, stab rivals in the back, and hop in bed together. All the while, Mona keeps stumbling across the mysterious traces of a violence she cannot explain. As her adventures in Scandinavia unfold, Mona finds that she has not so much escaped her demons as locked herself up with them in the middle of nowhere. In Mona, Pola Oloixarac paints a hypnotic, scabrous, and ultimately jaw-dropping portrait of a woman facing down a hipster elite to which she does and does not belong. A survivor of both patronization and bizarre sexual encounters, Mona is a new kind of feminist. But her past won' t stay past, and strange forces are working to deliver her the test of a lifetime.
*One of the Most Anticipated Books of 2021 in Vogue, Harper' s Bazaar, Esquire, The Week, and Literary Hub*Dense with clever analysis of the modes and mannerisms of literary society--readings that resemble postmodern performance art, dalliances that swing from Hay to Cartagena--Mona is the kind of novel you read with a sense that you' re in on some very juicy gossip. --Chloe Schama, VogueSmart, provocative . . . The rich inner life of its namesake character propels this vibrant examination of the writing world. --Publishers WeeklyOloixarac delivers a scathing indictment of the book circuit . . . Mona emerges as an intriguing subject, a woman who worries that the sum of her talents distills down to nothing more than her potent yet fragile sexuality. --Poornima Apte, BooklistA rapturous tour de force by Pola Oloixarac--one of the few writers I cannot live without--Mona is that novel that, once finished, leaves its reader perfectly, beautifully undone. Part mystery, part send-up of a literary world, part journey into night, Mona reminds us that no matter how far you fly, the past is always near. If Mona were any smarter, any funnier, any truer, I' m not sure my tender heart could have taken it. --Junot Diaz, author of This is How You Lose HerSly, bitter, and smart, Mona is at once a satirical comedy, a harrowing psychological portrait of a woman' s dissociation, and a philosophical indictment of the hubris of now. Read it and be surprised. --Siri Hustvedt, author of Memories of the FuturePola Oloixarac' s Mona is, simultaneously, a hilarious satire of literary pretensions, a sincere exploration of a damaged psyche, and a brilliantly unnerving new chapter in this writer' s inimitable body of work. It reads as though Rachel Cusk' s Outline Trilogy was thrown in a blender with Roberto Bolano' s 2666, and then lightly seasoned with the bitter flavor of Horacio Castellanos Moya. In other words: Oloixarac is one of my new favorite writers. --Andrew Martin, author of Cool for AmericaInternational literary gatherings are ripe for sharp satire, but they' re never as hilariously funny, weird, and adorable as the one portrayed in Mona. Brainy, cheerfully dirty, and caught in a fine mess, Mona herself, like this novel, is exhilarating company. --Francisco Goldman, author of Say Her Name In her signature prose style -- part philosophy professor, part stand-up comedian--Pola Oloixarac revels in disassembling the sanctimonious hypocrisies of those who proclaim to stand against sanctimonious hypocrisies: writers. --Mauro Javier Cardenas, author of AphasiaA provocative, defiant, clever, painful, empowering, hilarious novel of literary climax and sexual healing. Mona is like a sauna: you better not enter with your clothes on, or without a birch switch. --Valerie Miles, translator and co-founder of Granta en EspanolPraise for Pola Oloixarac Pola Oloixarac is one of the great writers of the Internet, the only country larger than Argentina. --Joshua Cohen, author of Moving KingsOloixarac' s wit and ambition are evident on every page. By comparison, most other contemporary fiction seems a little dull and simple-minded. --Hari Kunzru, author of White Tears
Pola Oloixarac was born in Buenos Aires in 1977. Her debut novel, Savage Theories, was a breakout bestseller in Argentina and was nominated for the Best Translated Book Award, and in 2010, Granta recognized her as one of the best young Spanish-language novelists. She was awarded the 2021 Eccles Centre & Hay Festival Writer' s Award. Oloixarac is a regular contributor to The New York Times, and her fiction has appeared in Granta, n+1, The White Review, and an issue of Freeman' s on The Future of New Writing. Pre-viously a resident of San Francisco, California, she currently resides in Barcelona.
Status: Active
ISBN-13: 9781788169882
Published: 3 Feb 2022
Published In: United Kingdom
Imprint: Serpent's Tail
Publisher: Profile Books
Format: Hardback
Height: 200mm
Width: 132mm
Spine: 24mm
Weight: 300g
Pages: 192

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