El sol mueve la sombra de las cosas quietas
Alejandra Kamiya

SHORT STORIES | 2019/2024 | 115 pages

Customs are like those paths that are forged by people stepping over grass and weeds over and over again, pushing them to the sides so that little by little, earth appears. And so, where before you could trace a route anywhere, suddenly it seems impossible to take a path other than the one of your own footsteps.

Instead of taking the subway like he does every day after work, Juan decides to walk.This insignificant act raises a series of unexpected questions about his job, his dog, the weekends he spends with his in-laws. Sara buys a piece of land that she projects her greatest dreams onto: having a house built with her own hands. In the middle of a retreat, the student Kamiya takes the opportunity to wander through the corridors of the convent and discovers a Universal Encyclopedia of Art in one of its rooms.

Over each of the thirteen stories in this book hovers the figure of the koan —the short story that belongs to Zen philosophy that encourages an unconventional look at reality, a point of view that isn’t facilitated by the system. This is what leads to the calm contemplation that is characteristic of Alejandra Kamiya’s writing, which transforms the most mundane facts and objects —from the description of bread cooking to a couple’s intimacy or the death of a father— into small odes to beauty and life.

*Represented on behalf of Eterna Cadencia

RIGHTS: spanish ETERNA CADENCIA