Mother Tongue: A Bogotan Story

3.1/5 ( ratings)

“When addressing a gringo, 90% of the time he or she will point out that you, foreigner, have an accent. Though some of them are nice about it, they are also telling you that you are a retard because you have an accent. This novella is laying the cornerstone for what will one day be a brick shithouse of an answer.”
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Thus spoke Enrique Márquez Pino, another Mexican who likes soccer. Colombian, really but who cares.

“Told with sharp humor and uninching honesty, Mother Tongue is a riotous, double-edged exploration of what it means to feel a stranger in one's own homeland. Juan Fernando Hincapié is a writer to watch.”
Patricia Engel, author of Vida and The Veins of the Ocean

“Funny, intelligent, and at times postmodern, this Bogotan story is also a page-turner, compelling and a pleasure to read. The characters we meet are real and weird and interesting. This book is a great introduction to Hincapié’s work inthe US, a writer who has already earned his place in the Colombian literary world.”
Daniel Chacón, author of Chicano Chicanery and Hotel Juarez

"One of the things I admire most about the books of Hincapié is how deeply he explores his characters’ nature through humor and the singularities of language. In this decade, marked by a political correctness that borders on the absurd, we should celebrate the arrival of a fresh and eloquent book like Mother Tongue.”
Orlando Echeverri Benedetti, author of Criacuervo