At once a dirty joke and a highbrow novel, this tale tells the bizarre story of Ramon Maria, a balding, middle-aged. trumpet player who wakes up one day with a massive neverending erection. Hailed across Europe as a masterpiece of literary parody, it is b
In Arabic, the word 'Makbara' refers to those parts of North African cemeteries where young couples go to get away from their elders and hang out. A celebration of Amour Fou, Makbara reveals Goytisolo's deep love for Arabic culture seen as sensuous and le
Exiled in Tangiers, cut off from home and country, the narrator of Count Julian rants against the homeland he was forced to leave: Spain. The second novel in Juan Goytisolo's trilogy (including Marks of Identity and Juan the Landless), this story of an ex
In 1943, General Thadeus Dreyer, a WWI hero who trains doubles for Nazi leaders, disappears. In 1960, Adolf Eichmann, a master chess player, is arrested in Buenos Aires, extradited to Israel, and hanged. Years later, a dying Polish count casts doubt on Ei
“A magnificent novel. Haunted by the tragic story and passion of its characters.”—Magazine LittéraireThe first of the Havana quartet featuring Inspector Mario Conde, a tropical Marlowe. A young transvestite in a beautiful red dress is found strangl
Lieutenant Mario Conde is suffering from a terrible New Year's Eve hangover. Though it's the middle of a weekend, he is asked to urgently investigate the mysterious disappearance of Rafael Morin, a high-level business manager in the Cuban nomenklatura. Co
The brutally mutilated body of Miguel Forcade is discovered washed up on a Havana beach. Head smashed in by a baseball bat, genitals cut off by a blunt knife. Forcade was once responsible for confiscating art works from the bourgeoisie fleeing the revolut
Josep Pla, a budding young writer, was studying law in Barcelona in 1918 when the university was shut down because of the Spanish flu epidemic. Pla returned to his parents’ house in the coastal town of Palafrugell, and with nothing to do he decided to k
