Perpetual Law

A woman embarks on a surreal quest in the delightfully bizarre and nightmarish latest from Mexican writer Bellatin (Beauty Salon). The main character, a reporter known only as Our Woman, is placed on house arrest after she’s caught stealing earrings from a foreign leader’s wife during an interview. While confined to her oceanside home, Our Woman receives a call from a place identified as “the House.” The speaker on the other end of the line says Our Woman can come to the House that night and listen to her childhood voice. Over the course of her journey across her city to the House, the narrative gradually reveals how Our Woman lost her son and her mother and how these events were connected to her unnamed country’s turn to authoritarianism. As these facts accrue, the protagonist’s bravery and the reason for her determination to reach the House come into focus. Stuffed with singular details—Our Woman uses canned-meat broth as tanning lotion; a foreign poet is concerned with “creating a series of grammatical rules for a new language”—the novella uses brisk, deadpan humor as a sly entry point into the weightiest of subjects. Hilarious and gut-wrenching in equal measure, this wondrous experiment is not to be missed. (Apr.)