In the Body a Voice— Maximiliano Barrientos

After a bloody civil war, Bolivia has ceased to exist as a nation. The population has abandoned the cities and retreated to rural communities, while armed groups known as the brigades impose their law with fire and sword. Executions, mass graves, and cannibalism: this is the backdrop of En el cuerpo una voz (A Voice in the Body), a novel that, based on a fictional event, condenses episodes from the history of many Latin American nations, and even from present-day Mexico.

Blending different temporalities, this is the story of a man who manages to escape a confrontation with the bloodiest of the brigades, the one commanded by the General; it is also an account, in the years after the armistice, of the memory of the conflict's survivors and of a young man whose parents were murdered by the General and his henchmen; finally, it is a reflection on the fine line that divides justice from revenge. With powerful and delirious writing, Maximiliano Barrientos confronts us with raw violence, both physical and psychological; but also with the possibilities we have to heal the wounds—social and individual—that we are capable of inflicting on each other.

No. of Pages: 224