Description

A SPELLBINDINGLY CREEPY COLLECTION OF SHORT STORIES, FROM AN ARGENTINIAN LITERARY STAR

‘The Grimm brothers and Franz Kafka pay a visit to Argentina in Samanta Schweblin’s darkly humorous tales.’ J.M. Coetzee

Spine-tingling and unexpected, unearthly and strange, the stories of Mouthful of Birds are impossible to forget.

The crunch of a bird’s wing.

A cloud of butterflies, so beautiful it smothers.

A crimson flash of blood across an artist’s canvas.

Samanta Schweblin’s writing expertly blurs the line between the surreal and the everyday, pulling the reader into a world that is at once nightmarish and beautiful. An exhilarating tour de force guaranteed to leave the pulse racing.

‘This is our world, and sharp-focused, but stripped of its usual meanings… Brutal violence is twisted into horrific, intensely experienced art.’ Guardian

*Longlisted for the Man Booker International Prize, 2019*

Publisher Review

'In this slim and superb book, Schweblin takes on the desire to love, to parent, and to care for one's own body - hardly extraordinary themes - and invests them with a fresh poignancy.' * Vogue, Most Anticipated Books of 2019 * 'Impressive...Schweblin is among the most acclaimed Spanish-language writers of her generation.' * New York Times * `The Grimm brothers and Franz Kafka pay a visit to Argentina in Samanta Schweblin's darkly humorous tales of people who have slipped through cracks or fallen down holes into alternate realities.' -- J.M. Coetzee `The author of the magnetic, scalp-prickling Fever Dream returns with stories as Gothic and incantatory as a telltale heart- virtuoso fiction from Argentina's own Edgar Allan Poe.' * Oprah Magazine * `This is our world, and sharp-focused, but stripped of its usual meanings... Brutal violence is twisted into horrific, intensely experienced art.' * Guardian * `These wild, unsettling, absurdist tales cement her status as a penetrating voice in modern fiction.' * New Statesman * `At once fantastically out there and real to the point of being haunting.' * Vanity Fair * `Schweblin is adept at creating...surreal images, distilled from our latent desires and preoccupations.' * Spectator * `Like its butterfly-carpeted jacket design, Mouthful of Birds has an eerie, disconcerting beauty that will preoccupy you long after you put it down.' * Irish Times * `Schweblin's Man Booker-shortlisted novel Fever Dream was unsettling and uncanny and these 20 brilliant stories, translated by Megan McDowell, are just as fabulous... an eerie blend of the supernatural and the all too real.' * Daily Mail * `These are fictions of indisputable power, presenting modern life as a farcical horror show in which our limitations and destructive appetites have made us ugly, ridiculous and doomed.' * Daily Telegraph * 'Modern horror at its most bewitching and resonant.' * Metro * `These fabulist half-light tales leave some elements tantalisingly unsaid or off-page, but are sharpened through her technique and clarity of prose.' * The List * `Schweblin's relentless style is engrossing.' * Totally Dublin * `Schweblin's imagination seemingly knows no bounds.' * Refinery29.com * `Samanta Schweblin's Mouthful of Birds - featuring a literal mouthful of birds - will mesmerise as it disturbs... It's difficult to do justice to Schweblin's relentlessly destabilising tone; just read the book, though perhaps only in daylight.' * Bustle * 'If you were a fan of Fever Dream, Schweblin's Man Booker International Prize-shortlisted nightmarish novella, brace yourself for this similarly surreal "unearthly" and "unsettling" collection of short stories. If you're a stranger to her work, take JM Coetzee's word for it: "The Grimm Brothers and Franz Kafka pay a visit to Argentina in Samanta Schweblin's darkly humorous tales of people who have slipped through the cracks or fallen down holes into alternative realities".' * Huffington Post India * `Schweblin once again deplys a heavy dose of nightmare fuel in this frightening, addictive collection... Canny, provocative and profoundly unsettling.' * Publishers Weekly (starred review) * `Schweblin builds dense and uncanny worlds, proing the psychology of human relationships and the ways we perceive existence and interpret culture, with dark humour and sharp teeth... An unquestionably imaginative author.' * Kirkus * `Samanta has a unique, inventive voice, and her stories have this ability to veer off into strange and unexpected territories with sublime grace. I admire and envy this gift.' -- Daniel Alarcon, author of At Night We Walk in Circles `Surreal and haunting, spare yet complex, Samanta Schweblin's fiction is like little else being written right now.' * Literary Hub * `Surreal, disturbing and decidedly original.' * Library Journal * `[Schweblin] can evoke more feelings in one sentence than many writers can in a whole story... Mouthful of Birds is a stunning achievement from a writer whose potential is beginning to seem limitless.' * NPR * `What separates Schweblin from the pack is the firm foot she has planted in frank horror, and her laconic style... Mouthful of Birds is precisely that rare mix: beauty and horror.' * Minneapolis Star-Tribune * `Dark, unsettling images, a sort of half-fevered, all-dazed awareness of the world outside. Schweblin is an absolute master.' * Remezcla * `Schweblin is back with this book of short stories, each more unnerving than the last, and all with the unique ability to leave you with that throbbing, pulsing feeling following an electric shock or a sleepless night or a solid scare or all of the above.' * Nylon.com * `Clever and morbidly funny.' * Book Riot *