Shortlisted for 2021 International Booker longlist The angel baby doesn’t look like a ghost. She doesn’t float and she isn’t pale and she doesn’t wear a white dress. She’s half rotted away, and she doesn’t talk. The first time she appeared, I thought it was a nightmare and I tried to wake up. When I couldn’t do it and I started to realize she was real, I screamed and cried and pulled the sheets over my head, my eyes squeezed tight and my hands over my ears so I couldn’t hear her—at that point I

Shortlisted for the International Booker Prize 2021My expectations for this one were not that high, as it is currently near the bottom of the Mookse group's ranking tables for the International Booker longlist, but on the whole, I was pleasantly surprised. Enríquez's stories are surreal and often nightmarish, and must owe something to the political climate in Argentina and its many disappearances that occurred. The stories are full of supernatural elements, but the fantasy is played down and the...

Chilling, this book will give you shivers! First let me say that I could not read this book anytime after 6:00pm because I live alone and I am not prepared for the repercussions of reading this and then falling asleep. This collection of 12 short stories will leave you with goosebumps and jumping every time you hear a sound. The stories are that convincing! The Dangers of Smoking In Bed is like a bag of chocolates, you never know what you will end up reading about but I can tell you these stor...

I am deeply upset over the turn this novel took. I will begin by saying this was a highly anticipated read for me, one that has received hype from reviewers I trust with my entire heart. Unfortunately, I was violently reminded, once again, not to trust cisgender reviewers with my safety. This may seem harsh, but continue reading and it was ideally make sense. I was LOVING this book. It is haunting, spooky, realism and magical realistic horror pulled together by writing that clung to the insides

‘’Or she’d hear a rooster crow in the middle of the night and remember - but who had told her? that at that hour of the night a rooster’s crow was a sign that someone was going to die.’’ Mariana Enriquez’s stories are merciless. They are brutal, raw, savage. They haunt you, they violate your mind and your soul. They are full of terrors, despair, obsession. Ghosts are desperate. Humans are cruel. Teenage dreams are burnt, children are threatened, women and men find themselves in limbo. This is

Shortlisted for The International Booker Prize 2021.Have you ever woken up gasping, just marginally escaping from the throes of a familiar yet intangible nightmare? Mariana Enriquez crafts a world composed of such nightmares in The Dangers of Smoking in Bed, a world in which your own malaise leaves the hollow chambers of your mind only to materialize in the world you inhabit.Sigmund Freud thought of dreams as the royal road to the unconscious and it is this unconscious desires and terrors that w...

It's so exciting to read new fiction that imaginatively blends the surreal and supernatural to tell inventive (oftentimes horrific) literary tales. In Enriquez's short stories the narrators are often haunted by ghosts or plagued by curses. Spirits enact their revenge. Communities are driven into a frenzy by fear. These stories frequently focus on or are told through the points of view of the vulnerable and maligned: children who are impoverished or abused, disenfranchised teenagers or deviants.

First impressionsThis is a short story collection by Argentine author Mariana Enriquez. All of these stories have a bit of the macabre. I am not sure whether I would classify them as magical realism or horror. But I will say is that I have been absolutely captivated by this collection. Each story touches upon some human element that is typically ignored. Her writing is utterly original and I find that I cannot help myself but to read the stories over back-to- back so that I can glean more from t...

A really captivating short story collection, with some real standout stories. The subject matter is really dark in places, switching from the more magical realism and fantastical to straight up horror, almost gore. This book should probably come with a boatload of trigger warnings, so bear that in mind if you decide to pick it up. But my god did Enríquez's writing capture my attention, and the translation by Megan McDowell was more than up for the task. I can't wait to explore more of Enríquez's...

These short stories were interesting and unsettling but weren't really that scary. There was some gore so be sure to check the trigger warnings. I enjoyed it but it's a bit forgettable compared to other short horror stories I have read. Angelita Unearthed - 3creepy baby with decaying flesh haunting her relative by wailing for her bones. yes, seems like a legit start Our Lady Of The Quarry - 1meh. brats are jealous of a douche and their fellow brat friend. not as creepy just really annoying

Mariana Enriquez became an instant favorite of mine after I read THINGS WE LOST IN THE FIRE, so I was anxiously awaiting her follow up, THE DANGERS OF SMOKING IN BED, and lemme tell ya, it did not disappoint. It would be unfair to compare these two collections, for they are vastly different creatures, but this collection seems a bit more personal than her previous one. THE DANGERS OF SMOKING IN BED has multiple mentions of characters stopping medication for anxiety and depression, and even more

Think about the most horrible things that can happen in life. Now, imagine that there’s no line between reality and your worst nightmares and what it would be like to only be able to see the world through the lens of superstition; to see the whole world as an evil omen of death. I can easily say this is the best short story collection I’ve ever read and that’s as much as I’m going to say about it, I’m afraid, because this is not the sort of book I would lightly recommend even to my best friend.

Now shortlisted for the 2021 International Booker Prize.It is translated by the prolific Megan McDowell (I have previously read her translations of Carlos Fonseca, Samantha Schweblin and Daniel Mella). The collection is unashamedly written in a fairly conventional horror genre style, and with one exception are shortish stories with a fairly simple story arc (oddly perhaps at least for me the least memorable story of all is the titular one) and a single “horror” twist or concept (often supernatur...