After the Bombs - Softcover

Arias, Arturo

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0915306891 ISBN 13: 9780915306893

Publisher: Curbstone Books, 1995

Synopsis

After the Bombs is a coming of age story that holds a mirror up to the modern history of Guatemala--a funhouse mirror of richly inventive and farcical black comedy which provides a better description of life in that country than any history book ever could. It opens with the bombing of Guatemala City in 1954 when the hero, Max, is a small child. In a swiftly moving narrative, Max journeys twoard adulthood, searching for his identitty, for his father, and along the way, for the real Guatemala and the possibility of a society founded on human decency, after the bombs.

About this title

About the Author:

Arturo Arias (Guatemala city, 1950) is a Guatemalan novelist and critic, who is currently a professor of 20th-century Spanish-American Literature at the University of Texas at Austin. He has taught courses specializing in: Central American literature; Indigenous literatures; social and critical theory; race, gender and sexuality in postcolonial societies; cultural studies, and ethnographic approaches. Professor Arias has previously taught at the Redlands University in Southern California and is a past president of the Latin American Studies Association. Dr. Arias holds a PhD in Sociology of Literature, from L'Ecole des Hautes Etudes Paris, France. (1978) He has written 6 novels and have been awarded with several prizes.

Asa Zatz was born in Mexico and has translated nearly one hundred books. He lives in New York.

From Publishers Weekly:

This powerful novel by the coauthor of the script for the film El Norte dissects the spirit of a country living through a nightmare. Based on the 1954 bombardment of Guatemala City by U.S. forces, it depicts Maximo, who comes of age in a world of corpse-littered streets, where the police are brigands, order is kept by random executions and the writing of books is a crime. At 13, Maximo falls in love with quirky Karen, daughter of the U.S. ambassador--until a case of mistaken identity leads to a violent, perverse attack on both of them. Against this sordid backdrop, he decides to become a writer--to "build a cathedral of words"--and tell the story of his people's agony, and attempt to unravel the mystery of his father's long-ago disappearance. He meets the beautiful Amarena, a well-connected prostitute who becomes his lover, confidante and ally. At the lavish funeral of the local CIA chief, Maximo intrudes into the proceedings to read a story he's written exposing the horrors of Guatemala and lampooning U.S. officials. While he tries to escape the ensuing dragnet, Amarena comes to his rescue in an ending that adds a fillip of hope to a brutal, compelling morality tale. Author tour.
Copyright 1990 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Curbstone Books
• Publication date: 1995
• ISBN 10: 0915306891
• ISBN 13: 9780915306893
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 221