LETRAS

Tras cautivar a millones de lectores con Un caballero en Moscú, Amor Towles vuelve a seducirnos con su elegancia, humor e ingenio narrativo en Mesa para dos, seis relatos que transcurren en Nueva York al filo del cambio del milenio y una novela breve ambientada en la Edad de Oro de Hollywood. Aparentemente inconexas, todas estas historias presentan un momento crítico en que dos personas deben sentarse a una mesa para abordar asuntos tan universales como la búsqueda de la felicidad, el poder del dinero o la subversión de las normas sociales. Así sucede en relatos tan conmovedores como «La cola», que sigue el periplo de dos campesinos rusos, Pushkin y su mujer Irina, desde su aldea hasta Nueva York pasando por Moscú, mientras intentan desarrollar su potencial sin traicionar sus ideales; o en «La balada de Timothy Touchett», donde un escritor frustrado acepta un trabajo poco edificante hasta que Paul Auster se cruza en su camino. O en «Eve en Hollywood», una vibrante novela con tintes de género negro que nos permite reencontrarnos con Evelyn Ross, la indomable protagonista de Normas de cortesía, aquí decidida a labrarse un futuro entre platós, bungalós y los antros más oscuros de Los Ángeles de los años cuarenta. Creador de personajes que nos transportan en el tiempo y nos dejan una huella imborrable, Amor Towles muestra de nuevo su enorme talento en Mesa para dos. En este fascinante libro, lleno de dramatismo, agudeza, erudición y ternura, el autor vuelve a sus temas de siempre —las relaciones, la familia, la confianza, la ambición, la culpa o el valor de la amistad— con su acostumbrada hondura y belleza.

If you want to stay, you have to die. In a small fishing town known for its aging birding community and the local oyster farm, a hidden evil emerges from the depths of the ocean. It begins with sea snails washing ashore, attacking whatever they cling to. This mysterious infection starts transforming the wildlife, the seascapes, and finally, the people. Once infected, residents of Baywood start “deading”: collapsing and dying, only to rise again, changed in ways both fanatical and physical. As the government cuts the town off from the rest of the world, the uninfected, including the introverted bird-loving Blas and his jaded older brother Chango, realize their town could be ground zero for a fundamental shift in all living things. Soon, disturbing beliefs and autocratic rituals emerge, overseen by the death-worshiping Risers. People must choose how to survive, how to find home, and whether or not to betray those closest to them. Stoked by paranoia and isolation, tensions escalate until Blas, Chango, and the survivors of Baywood must make their escape or become subsumed by this terrifying new normal.

This Great Hemisphere is powerful, captivating novel about how far we’ll go to protect the ones we love. With the worldbuilding of N. K. Jemisin’s novels and blazing defiance of Naomi Alderman’s work, it is also a story about what happens when we resist the narratives others write about us. Northwestern Hemisphere, 2529: an Earth on which half of people are now born literally invisible. Sweetmint, a young woman, is one of them and thus relegated to second-class citizenship. She has done everything right her entire life, from school to landing a highly sought-after apprenticeship. But all she has fought so hard to earn comes crashing down when she learns that her brother (whom she had presumed dead) is not only alive and well but also the primary suspect in a high-profile political murder.