Mundo Cruel: Stories

Description

Luis Negron's debut collection reveals the intimate world of a small community in Puerto Rico joined together by its transgressive sexuality. The writing straddles the shifting line between pure, unadorned storytelling and satire, exploring the sometimes hilarious and sometimes heartbreaking nature of survival in a decidedly cruel world.

Reviews

"Slender but never slight, and often extremely funny, the nine stories in this debut collection offer insight into both gay life in Puerto Rico and the human condition in general...the reader should be left both completely satisfied and wanting more."--"Publishers Weekly" "Hilarious and heart-wrenching, provocative and pitch-perfect, each story is a tiny, transgressive explosion. I feel inadequate to the task of expressing just how wonderful this book is...read it slowly, and listen close; here is a master storyteller at his finest."--Justin Torres, author of "We the Animals" "Negron is perhaps the most intimate and unsuspected heir to Manuel Puig."--Antonio Morato, author of "Lima y Limon" "These nine stories are rude, beautiful, funny, tender, sarcastic but, above all, human."--Guillermo Barquero, "Sentencias inutiles " "Like a cross between Manuel Puig and Luis Rafael Sanchez, the author of these stories shows us the tenderness, the love, and the bravery of those who decide to embrace their identity, whatever it happens to be."--Margarita Pintado Burgos, "Desvalijadas" "Negron has a knack for portraying the insight and pathos that arise when old-school romantic, wounded souls collide. In nine short fictional monologues, he brilliantly depicts the campy queers, effeminate banter, and rough trade of Santurce, a low-rent neighborhood in San Juan. Negron's humor and heart put him in the canon of gay high satire headed by Manuel Puig, the author of Kiss of the Spider Woman..."--"Out Magazine" "Luis Negron is a very gifted storyteller, and one who is not afraid to steer straight into shameful and hurtful memories at top speed, confessing them with no fear or need of pity. "Mundo Cruel" will make you laugh and will make you cringe--but what would life be without its ups and downs?"--Charlie Vazquez, "Latino Rebels" "Luis Negron's debut story collection, "Mundo Cruel," is a study in verve, sass, and voice, peppered with an

Author description

LUIS NEGRoN was born in the city of Guayama, Puerto Rico, in 1970. He is co-editor of "Los otros cuerpos," an anthology of queer writing from Puerto Rico and the Puerto Rican diaspora. The original Spanish language edition of "Mundo Cruel," ""first published in Puerto Rico in 2010 by La Secta de Los Perros, then by Libros AC in subsequent editions, is now in its third printing. It has never before appeared in English Negron lives in Santurce, Puerto Rico. SUZANNE JILL LEVINE's many translations include the works of Guillermo Cabrera Infante and Manuel Puig. She is the editor of the Penguin Classics Jorge Luis Borges series and author of "The Subversive Scribe: Translating Latin American Fiction." She is winner of the 2012 the PEN Center USA Literary Award for her translation of Jose Donoso's "The Lizard's Tale."