In Raisa Tolchinsky’s take on Dante’s INFERNO, we are ushered into hell not by Virgil but by a chorus of female boxers.
Reservoir Bitches – Dahlia de la Cerda
In a country that has one of the world’s highest femicide rates, an irreverent tongue works as an imperfect, slapdash shield.
Misinterpretation – Ledia Xhoga
[Xhoga’s narrator] lives a double life, oscillating between a state of deep intimacy and complete isolation.
[The protagonist’s] worst fears about the corrupting properties of domination have come true. They have moved through this particular crosscurrent of power and emerged someone they never wanted to be.
Mothersland – Shahzoda Samarqandi
Mahtab has translated herself into her mother, and she has translated the past to make it her own.
Love the World or Get Killed Trying – Alvina Chamberland
A dangerous hypervisibility . . . follows trans women onto every street corner, every subway car, every first date with a man, making us less safe every day of our lives.
As the narrator . . . identifies increasingly with their tools, the desert feels more and more like a living being, breathing sand outside its original bounds, germinating and folding blades of grass, unwilling to be captive to . . . humans.
Telling your story doesn’t necessarily mean succumbing to the hefty weight of narrativization . . . reality is messy and incoherent—why not make stories that way?
What’s important about Bratton’s rendering of sex isn’t just that it’s true to life, but that it paints a complex portrait of a person with a dark sexual history.
To Hell With Poets – Baqytgul Sarmekova
Each story is narrated from a third person ranging from a distant voice to a very close omniscient one . . . Consistent, however, is each character on a journey with no end.