Faces in the Crowd

Valeria Luiselli was born in Mexico City in 1983 & grew up in South Africa. Her work has been translated into many languages & has appeared in publications includingthe New York Times, Granta, & McSweeney's.

From the author of Lost Children Archive: "Masterful...a novel in which people die many times just to wake up right where they left off."? The Paris Review In Mexico City, a young mother is writing a novel of her days as a translator living in New York. In Harlem, a translator is desperate to publish the works of Gilberto Owen, an obscure Mexican poet. And in Philadelphia, Gilberto Owen recalls his friendship with Lorca, and the young woman he saw in the windows of passing trains. Valeria Luiselli's debut signals the arrival of a major international writer and an unexpected and necessary voice in contemporary fiction. "An extraordinary new literary talent."— The Daily Telegraph "In part a portrait of the artist as a young woman, this deceptively modest-seeming, astonishingly inventive novel creates an extraordinary intimacy...Youth, from unruly student years to early motherhood and a loving marriage—and then, in the book's second half, wilder and something else altogether, the fearless, half-mad imagination of youth, I might as well call it—has rarely been so freshly, charmingly, and unforgettably portrayed. Valeria Luiselli is a masterful, entirely original writer."—Francisco Goldman "Haunting...Luiselli plays with the idea of time and identity with grace and intuition." — Publishers Weekly "Lovely and eccentric...peppered with arresting imagery."— The New York Times "Reminiscent of Roberto Bolano and Andre Gide, Luiselli navigates a dynamic, ghostly world between worlds, crisscrossing fact and fiction. Few books are as sure to baffle, surprise, and reward readers as the strange, shifty experiment that is Luiselli's fiction debut." ?Booklist One of Electric Literature 's25 Best Novels of the Year
One of Largehearted Boy 'sFavorite Novels of the Year

From the author of Lost Children Archive: "Masterful...a novel in which people die many times just to wake up right where they left off."― The Paris Review In Mexico City, a young mother is writing a novel of her days as a translator living in New York. In Harlem, a translator is desperate to publish the works of Gilberto Owen, an obscure Mexican poet. And in Philadelphia, Gilberto Owen recalls his friendship with Lorca, and the young woman he saw in the windows of passing trains. Valeria Luiselli's debut signals the arrival of a major international writer and an unexpected and necessary voice in contemporary fiction. "An extraordinary new literary talent."— The Daily Telegraph "In part a portrait of the artist as a young woman, this deceptively modest-seeming, astonishingly inventive novel creates an extraordinary intimacy...Youth, from unruly student years to early motherhood and a loving marriage—and then, in the book's second half, wilder and something else altogether, the fearless, half-mad imagination of youth, I might as well call it—has rarely been so freshly, charmingly, and unforgettably portrayed. Valeria Luiselli is a masterful, entirely original writer."—Francisco Goldman "Haunting...Luiselli plays with the idea of time and identity with grace and intuition." — Publishers Weekly "Lovely and eccentric...peppered with arresting imagery."— The New York Times "Reminiscent of Roberto Bolano and Andre Gide, Luiselli navigates a dynamic, ghostly world between worlds, crisscrossing fact and fiction. Few books are as sure to baffle, surprise, and reward readers as the strange, shifty experiment that is Luiselli's fiction debut." ―Booklist One of Electric Literature 's 25 Best Novels of the Year One of Largehearted Boy 's Favorite Novels of the Year Electric Literature 25 Best Novels of 2014 Largehearted Boy Favorite Novels of 2014 "An extraordinary new literary talent."? The Daily Telegraph "In part a portrait of the artist as a young woman, this deceptively modest-seeming, astonishingly inventive novel creates an extraordinary intimacy, a sensibility so alive it quietly takes over all your senses, quivering through your nerve endings, opening your eyes and heart. Youth, from unruly student years to early motherhood and a loving marriage?and then, in the book's second half, wilder and something else altogether, the fearless, half-mad imagination of youth, I might as well call it?has rarely been so freshly, charmingly, and unforgettably portrayed. Valeria Luiselli is a masterful, entirely original writer."?Francisco Goldman In Mexico City, a young mother is writing a novel of her days as a translator living in New York. In Harlem, a translator is desperate to publish the works of Gilberto Owen, an obscure Mexican poet. And in Philadelphia, Gilberto Owen recalls his friendship with Lorca, and the young woman he saw in the windows of passing trains. Valeria Luiselli's debut signals the arrival of a major international writer and an unexpected and necessary voice in contemporary fiction. "Luiselli's haunting debut novel, about a young mother living in Mexico City who writes a novel looking back on her time spent working as a translator of obscure works at a small independent press in Harlem, erodes the concrete borders of everyday life with a beautiful, melancholy contemplation of disappearance. . . . Luiselli plays with the idea of time and identity with grace and intuition." ? Publishers Weekly Grantland Book of the Year
Vol. 1 Brooklyn, A Year of Favorites, Jason Diamond
Book Riot, 2014’s Must-Read Books from Indie Presses

"Valeria Luiselli is a writer of formidable talent, destined to be an important voice in Latin American letters. Her vision and language are precise, and the power of her intellect is in evidence on every page."—Daniel Alarcón

"I'm completely captivated by the beauty of the paragraphs, the elegance of the prose, the joy in the written word, and the literary sense of this author."—Enrique Vilas-Matas

Valeria Luiselli is an evening cyclist; a literary tourist in Venice, searching for Joseph Brodsky's tomb; an excavator of her own artifacts, unpacking from a move. In essays that are as companionable as they are ambitious, she uses the city to exercise a roving, meandering intelligence, seeking out the questions embedded in our human landscapes.

Valeria Luiselli was born in Mexico City in 1983 and grew up in South Africa. Her novel and essays have been translated into many languages and her work has appeared in publications including the New York Times, Granta, and McSweeney's. Some of her recent projects include a ballet performed by the New York City Ballet in Lincoln Center; a pedestrian sound installation for the Serpentine Gallery in London; and a novella in installments for workers in a juice factory in Mexico. She lives in New York City.
Grantland Book of the Year Vol. 1 Brooklyn , A Year of Favorites, Jason Diamond Book Riot , 2014's Must-Read Books from Indie Presses "Valeria Luiselli is a writer of formidable talent, destined to be an important voice in Latin American letters. Her vision and language are precise, and the power of her intellect is in evidence on every page."—Daniel Alarcón "I'm completely captivated by the beauty of the paragraphs, the elegance of the prose, the joy in the written word, and the literary sense of this author."—Enrique Vilas-Matas Valeria Luiselli is an evening cyclist; a literary tourist in Venice, searching for Joseph Brodsky's tomb; an excavator of her own artifacts, unpacking from a move. In essays that are as companionable as they are ambitious, she uses the city to exercise a roving, meandering intelligence, seeking out the questions embedded in our human landscapes. Valeria Luiselli was born in Mexico City in 1983 and grew up in South Africa. Her novel and essays have been translated into many languages and her work has appeared in publications including the New York Times , Granta , and McSweeney's . Some of her recent projects include a ballet performed by the New York City Ballet in Lincoln Center; a pedestrian sound installation for the Serpentine Gallery in London; and a novella in installments for workers in a juice factory in Mexico. She lives in New York City. A dazzling follow-up to the novel Faces in the Crowd , this collection of literary peregrinations around the margins of metropolitan life demonstrates Valeria Luiselli's equal virtuosity as a writer of non-fiction. Evocative, erudite and consistently surprising, these narrative essays explore the places - real and imagined - that shape our lives. Whether wandering the familiar streets of her neighbourhood, revisiting the landmarks of her past, or getting lost in a foreign city, Valeria Luiselli plots a unique and exhilarating course that traces unexpected pathways between diverse ideas and reveals the world from a fresh perspective. Here, we follow Luiselli as she cycles around Mexico City, shares a cigarette with the night porter in her Harlem apartment, and hunts down a poet's tomb in Venice. Each location sparks Luiselli's nimble curiosity and prompts imaginative reflections on topics as varied as the fluidity of identity, the elusiveness of words that can't be translated, the competing methods of arranging a bookcase, and the way that city-dwellers evade eye-contact with their neighbours, while spying on their lives. Sidewalks cements Luiselli's reputation as one of Latin America's most original, smart and exciting new literary voices. A multi-layered story told by two narrators: a 21st-century Emily Dickinson living in Mexico City who relates to the world vicariously through her children and a past that both overwhelms and liberates her, and a dying poet living in a run-down apartment in Philadelphia in the 1950s. While she tells the story of her past as a young editor in New York City desperately trying to convince a publisher to translate and publish the works of Gilberto Owen-an obscure Mexican poet who lived in Harlem during the 1920s and whose ghostly presence constantly haunts her in the subway-she also relates the slow but inevitable disintegration of her present family life. Cosmopolitan, vivacious essays in the tradition of Brodsky's Watermark and Benjamin's The Arcades Project by a celebrated young Mexican author. Collapsing narratives and the perils of translation from ""one of the most important new voices in Mexican writing."" (Alma Guillermoprieto).