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Zusatztext "A spectacular read... Storytelling magic." -- The Miami Herald "Magic realism is in flower! but beneath its extravagant exaggerations lie serious observations about human nature." -- The New York Times Book Review "[B]rilliant... a modern tragedy where madness goes hand in hand with the absurd." -- El Pais Informationen zum Autor Eliseo Alberto is a poet, journalist, and filmmaker. He lives in Mexico City. Klappentext Eliseo Alberto's award-winning Caracol Beach combines the passionate imagination of magic realism with the plotting of a thriller (and a modicum of farce). The result is a literary tour de force. Beto Milanes, the night watchman at a graveyard in the Florida resort town of Caracol Beach, is a guilt-ridden Cuban war veteran. Tormented by memories and hallucinations, he yearns to die but is unable to take his own life. Instead, he decides to force someone-anyone-to kill him. That decision sets in motion a night of violence that draws an odd assortment of characters into Beto's orbit. In scenes that range from the jungles of Angola to a seedy Florida bar, Alberto explores war, madness, exile, and the redemptive power of love. Translated by Edith Grossman. Chapter One Clemency isn't a word that is used very often. On the previous night the soldier had dreamed again about the Bengal tiger, and he woke with a start, the taste of rotting meat in his mouth. He spat blood. His nerves had destroyed his gums, and no matter how much he rinsed his mouth with bicarbonate of soda, and even though he drank a thousand cups of coffee and smoked a thousand unfiltered Camels, the acid of the infection kept draining, drop by drop. He dressed under the blanket. Ever since his cavalry during the war in Ibond? de Ak?, eighteen years earlier, he had taken the precaution of sleeping with his boots on, a habit that eventually devastated his feet with raging fungus infections. He tried to take refuge in a happy memory and escape the trap that way. He failed. Through narrowed eyes he saw the tiger come in. A tiger. The tiger. That one. The yellow one. From Bengal. Its presence took his breath away. It would appear without warning in a derangement of dreams and then give him no peace. Before he caught sight of it under the table, toying with a rat from the garbage dump, he had smelled its rank poppy-cream scent, like a whore's perfume floating in the dawn air, and he woke in anguish. He heard the distant crowing of early morning roosters, the motors of cars driving along the highway, the sound of an ocean he knew was too far away, but only when he saw a ring of seven blowflies resting on the ceiling lightbulb did a snapping twig tell him the devil was near. The flies were startled and stirred the air with the windmill vanes of their wings. Each time he had the nightmare the compass of his mind switched poles and led him down blind alleys. The tiger was slavering. It was thirsty. Or maybe hungry. The rat wasn't enough. It wanted another one. It wanted him. "Virgin of Regla! In the name of all you hold dear, tell it to go away! Let there be Light and Progress for you," he pleaded. His prayer crashed into the hills. The echo rebounded through the swirling mist. Since taking the job as night watchman at the auto salvage yard in Caracol Beach, he had lived in a trailer that had once been a circus wagon. The name could still be read in an arc of showy calligraphy that was faded and weathered: five star show. traveling rodeo. performers and gypsy fortunetellers. trained animals. private dressing-rooms. The sides were painted with images of lions, bearded ladies, and trapeze artists. The interior of the car was equipped with everything needed to make it a habitable prison: the cot attached with hinges to the back wall, a two-burner hot plate to cook on, and a tiny bathroom ...
