Un Amor by Sara Mesa

Un Amor by Sara Mesa

Spanish fiction

Original title – Un Amor

Translator – Katie Whittemore

Source – subscription

I haven’t reviewed as many of the recent books from Peirene Press as I used to the older ones, but this came from a subscription to them, and I had seen them picture it on social media. I was pleased to have the chance to review another book from Sara Mesa, as I had reviewed Scar from her a few years ago when it came out from Dalkey Archive. She has also had open-letter publisher books in the past. She is known for how she can put her characters into uncomfortable and unusual situations. Thus, she gives them depth as we see how they cope emotionally with the conditions. So, this story of a woman escaping past mistakes to only face a whole load of new challenges appealed to me.

Country people, he sighs. Nobody keeps track of these things. They’re stupid and stubborn, and often cruel to the point of savagery. He was brought a greyhound the other day. The animal was torn to bits. Nothing he could do to save it. She simply cannot imagine how hard it is to work in a place like Petacas. Like running into a brick wall, he says, day after day. Nat listens wordlessly. Her problem now is an economic one. Chipping and deworming Sieso, plus buying good dog food, is going to cost a lot more than she’d bargained for. And still, she fears, there’s the question of his shots. But even with the money she’ll spend, the blow to her budget, the most unpleasant part of the process, the most costly, will be interacting with the landlord

Here is a great observation about those left in the village

Nat has left her past in the city, where she had some problems that led her to move to the rural village of La Escapa. She has found a small house she feels is okay, miles away from her past, and is settled. She and the dog got a gift from the landlord, but the dog isn’t a fan of its new owner. She starts with an idyllic life in her new home, but even a feeling of more is in the background. But she soon. Little things begin to happen around her, like the house having a few things that are not right, then the strange bunch of locals. This is a twist on the. Village life where things are weird, she isn’t local, and this shows. Then a intense relationship with a man known as the German he had come to help fix the roof. The village is a holiday place as many houses are empty. Maybe this is part of the reason those left have become such an odd bunch of characters. The book gets darker as it goes on after she accepts a strange request, and things turn sour for her.

‘I left my job,’ she says at last. I couldn’t take any more.’

*What did you do?’

Nat pulls back. She doesn’t want to go into detail. It was an office job, she says. Commercial translations, correspondence with foreign clients, stuff like that. Not badly paid work, but definitely a far cry from her interests. Piter lights a cigarette, squints with the first drag.

Well, you’re brave.’

‘Why?’

‘Because no one quits their job these days.’

Her past is hinted at her and there in the book like this about leaving her old job

This is a slow burner of a book, a woman with scattered fragments of why she ended up in the village. She and the dog make an odd couple, but things start sour. it is like the sepia glasses she had the first few days have gone, and we see that you can’t outrun problems as you may have left them behind. But there is always a new problem and new set of issues to deal with, and this is what Mesa does so well in her books; I have found how people deal with those twists and turns and the slow-burning tale of one woman escaping from the city, fast love affairs, and the outcome of both. Unsettling ideas and plot lines leave you unsettled as you read. This book would make a great series as it slowly burns, and like all the great Peirene books, it feels much larger than its mere 150 pages. A book that takes you into one woman’s journey and eventual escape back to the city. It shows there are problems no matter where, but also how vulnerable a single woman can be in certain situations. One wonders if the title of the village is twofold: an escape to go to and escape from? Have you read this book?

Winston score – A reminds me of what I loved about the early Peirene books: As an escape into another world for a couple of hours.