Un Amor: A Novel

Subtly in the vein of Dogville or Coetzee's Disgrace, and invoking the works of Agota Kristof, Un Amor probes ideas of language, alienation, and community through the eyes of a woman who, when brought into conflict, finds herself on the potential brink of deeper awareness of herself and her place in the world.

On the heels of a cryptic mistake, Nat arrives in La Escapa, an arid rural village in Spain's interior. She settles into a small, shabby house with cheap rent to begin work on her first literary translation, with a skittish and ill-tempered dog--a gift from the boorish landlord--her only company.

Burdened with assumptions about country life, Nat will enter into relationships with the handful of local inhabitants--her negligent landlord, Píter the hippie, the dementia-afflicted Roberta, the young city family who comes on weekends, the unsociable man they call "The German"--from whom she appears to receive a customary welcome.

Mutual misunderstanding and a persistent sense of alienation, however, thrum below the surface. And when conflicts arise over repairs to the house, Nat receives an offer and makes a crucial decision.

In prose as taut and oppressive as the atmosphere in La Escapa, Un Amor extends Mesa's exploration of language and power, confronting readers with the limits of their own morality as tensions mount and the community's most unexpected impulses emerge.

Author: Sara Mesa
Publisher: Open Letter
Published: 11/21/2023
Pages: 140
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.35lbs
Size: 8.00h x 4.80w x 0.70d
ISBN13: 9781948830775
ISBN10: 1948830779
BISAC Categories:
- Fiction | Literary
- Fiction | Women
- Fiction | World Literature | Spain | 21st Century

About the Author
Sara Mesa is the author of eight works of fiction, including Scar (winner of the Ojo Critico Prize), Four by Four (a finalist for the Herralde Prize), An Invisible Fire (winner of the Premio Málaga de Novela), Among the Hedges, and Un amor, which was named by several Spanish newspapers as the book of the year for 2020. Her works have been translated into more than ten different languages, and she has been widely praised for her concise, sharp writing style.

Katie Whittemore translates from the Spanish. Full-length translations include works by Sara Mesa, Javier Serena, Aroa Moreno Durán, Lara Moreno, Nuria Labari, and Katixa Agirre. Forthcoming translations include novels by Jon Bilbao, Juan Gómez Bárcena, Almudena Sánchez, Aliocha Coll, and Pilar Adón. She received an NEA Translation Fellowship in 2022 to translate Moreno's In Case We Lose Power.