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"Trash interweaves the voices of three women with connections to the municipal garbage dump of Ciudad Juâarez, Mexico. Sylvia Aguilar Zâeleny's English-language debut shows the complexities of survival and joy, love and violence for three women: a teenager abandoned by her guardian at the dump, a scientist doing research on residents of the dump, and a transwoman living nearby who is the matriarch of a group of sex workers. Each character navigates family, abandonment, power, jealousy, greed, and multiple taboos around sexuality and gender violence. Their stories are linked by geography and by ideas of waste and abandonment. As Aguilar Zâeleny explores these territories, she asks crucial questions: Who is seen as disposable and why? How do women find their own means of survival and joy in the midst of a perilous sociopolitical context? What does it mean to live a life in a time of austerity and extreme violence? Trash is a critical intervention in Mexican literature"--
About the author
Sylvia Aguilar Zéleny received her MFA in Creative Writing from The University of Texas at El Paso. She is the author of four short-story books and a young adult novel series. Her novel Todo Eso Es Yo won the National Book Award in Tamaulipas, México in 2015, and was republished as The Everything I Have Lost (Cinco Puntos Press, 2020) as a rewriting in English. Her work has been included in anthologies in México, the United States, Australia, Peru, and South Korea. She has also given conferences and participated in various panels addressing the work of women writers of Latin America, as well as panels on teaching bilingual creative writing and/or teaching fiction to first or second generation students.
JD Pluecker has translated numerous books from the Spanish, including Gore Capitalism (Semiotext(e), 2018), Antígona González (Les Figues Press, 2016), and Writing with Caca by Luis Felipe Fabre (Green Lantern Press, 2021). Their book of poetry and image, Ford Over, was released in 2016 from Noemi Press. JD is a recipient of the Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writing Grant and has exhibited work at Blaffer Art Museum, the Hammer Museum, Project Row Houses, and more.
Summary
Trash interweaves the voices of three women with lived connections to the municipal garbage dump of Ciudad Juárez, Mexico.
Aguilar Zéleny's Trash shows the complexities of survival and joy, love and violence for three women: a teenager abandoned by her guardian at the dump, a scientist doing research on the residents of the dump, and a transwoman living nearby who is the matriarch of a group of sex workers.
Each one of the characters navigates family, abandonment, power, jealousy, greed, and multiple taboos around sexuality and gender violence. Their stories are linked by geography and by ideas of waste and abandonment.
As Aguilar Zéleny explores these territories in her book, she asks crucial questions: Who is seen as disposable and why? How do women find their own means of survival and joy in the midst of a perilous sociopolitical context? What does it mean to live a life in a time of austerity and extreme violence? Trash is a critical intervention in Mexican literature.
Foreword
- Serialization targeting BOMB, Granta, Paris Review, AGNI, New England Review, Southwest Review, Cincinnati Review, Literary Hub
- Targeted outreach to publications spotlighting translated literature: World Literature Today, Asymptote, Words Without Borders, Latin American Literature Today
- Local coverage outreach to Texas Monthly, Dallas Morning News
- Promotion at/events pitched for Texas Book Festival, Dallas Literary Festival
- Events: virtual and in-person events with Texas bookstores and venues
- Promotion on the publisher’s website (deepvellum.org), Twitter feed (@deepvellum), and Facebook page (/deepvellum); publisher’s e-newsletter to booksellers, reviewers, librarians
Additional text
“Sylvia Aguilar Zéleny has constructed a novel that impregnates itself into the skin and the nose: Garbage. Not infrequently, I was submerged into its pages and suddenly felt that something around me smelled awful. And it’s the truth: something smells awful in this country." —Óscar Alarcón, El Popular"The masterful way that Sylvia Aguilar Zéleny develops the characters is evidence that the author has a high level of narrative power." —Raul Picazo, Crash
