We just received the following press release about the new English translation of Oswaldo Salazar's book "Por el lado Oscuro". Salazar was recently in London to take part in launches of the book that included an event in Canning House and then the Instituto Cervantes. Having read the book - it is certainly a compelling read. And pre-revolutionary Guatemala is certainly an interesting time to look at. Guatemala has a new master of narrative in the form of Oswaldo Salazar, whose compelling first novel From the Darkness is one of the few works of Central American literature to explore the region's criminal history.
In From the Darkness - the English translation of the prize-winning Por el lado oscuro - Salazar explores the bitterly unhappy circumstances that can make a woman kill, and the unforgiving quality of male justice.
From the Darkness is a captivating story of a murder and the ensuing investigation that became known as "The Gourd Poisoning" in a traditional society unprepared for a crime that lay outside its powers of reasoning. It begins in the spring of 1939 when a man dies in agony at the San Juan de Dios de Amatitlán Hospital outside Guatemala City. His wife and children are accused of poisoning him, shattering the calm of a land kept in fearful order by the cold and tempestuous dictator General Jorge Ubico (1931-44).
Salazar's work touches a raw Latin nerve, giving the reader a unique insight into lost Central American worlds: that of the Guatemalan peasant woman - ignored, abused and constantly judged by her unforgiving male superiors; that of the small, rural Latin American town, where a handful of strongmen oversee all life; and that of the era of military caudillos, dictators whose quest for order and progress shapes all official culture.
The winner of the prestigious 2003 Mario Monteforte Toledo Prize, Por el lado oscuro was translated by Gavin O'Toole and will be published by Aflame Books in March 2007.
The Mexican writer Carlos Montemayor said of this book: "Por el lado oscuro has a magnificent narrative quality, exposition and style as well as a forceful central character, delivering the unexpected features of a species of crime novel within a work of historical reconstruction."
Oswaldo Salazar was born in Guatemala City in 1959 and has had a distinguished academic career. He took his first degree in philosophy and literature at Rafael Landívar University in Guatemala then studied as a Fulbright Scholar at Boston College in the United States. He currently teaches at Guatemala's Francisco Marroquín University.
Aflame Books is a small, independent UK publisher committed to publishing in English translation works from Latin America, Africa and the Middle East.
