Review: The Guilty
Juan Villoro (trans. Kimi Traubb) 136 pages George Braziller, Inc. (2015)
Read this if you like: Denis Johnson, Roberto Bolaño, Mexican culture
tl;dr summary: Magical realism without the magic in modern Mexico
The stark beauty of the voice was first thing that captured me in The Guilty. It’s tight at a language level, with short sentences and sparse, straightforward prose. Villoro uses the first person POV as the ultimate show-don’t-tell tool, painting a picture for the reader as much through how the narrator tells the story—the details they choose to give, the moments they linger on, the way they navigate time—as through on-page descriptions.
Normally I like a bit more voice variety in my short story collections, but I never found myself getting bored with the voice in The Guilty and I can’t quite figure out why. Not only is it all in 1st person past but the characters—while all obviously different people—are incredibly similar: all unnamed, cynical to one degree or another, and sharing a common apathy, not just a lack of agency but almost a rejection of it.
I do feel like this same-ness was intentional, though, and reinforced by the recurring themes that weave through the collection. Perception versus reality is one of the strongest I saw, especially as it relates to the landscape of Mexico. In both “The Guilty” and “Amigos Mexicanos” the conflict stems from the narrator being asked to present the “real” Mexico as their audience wants to see it: violent and sad. El Tomate’s quest for authenticity in “Mayan Dusk” plays on this same theme, and it’s explored in a different way in “Mariachi”, interwoven with questions of masculinity, virility, and machismo. In some way, the characters in every story wrestle with the expectations people have about their landscape and how that shapes their lives and identity.
Related to this theme of perception is the recurring idea of missed signs. This is stated directly in “Order Suspended” but comes up elsewhere, too—in the signs of infidelity missed in “Amigos Mexicanos”, for example, or the omens and prophecies discussed and shown in “Mayan Dusk”.
One thing that I think kept these stories from reading as repetitive is the rhythm and joy of the language. It embues the stories with energy that drives the reader forward, and while the narrators of the stories are similar there are subtle differences between the voices in the words they use and the details they note about the world around them. Of course, with any work in translation, there’s a question of whether this rhythm is intrinsic to the original or a contribution of the translator, and I’m eager to track this one down in Spanish to get a better sense. Either way, though, it’s successful throughout.
While the stories in The Guilty never go overtly speculative, there’s an absurdity to many of the tales that gives them the feel of being in a slant reality. This was strongest to me “The Whistle”, the story of an aging footballer recruited for a team owned by the Chinese mafia. Possibly I would have felt more grounded if I knew more about Mexican football, but I have a feeling the surreal feeling of this world is intentional.
As much as I love the voice of these stories, the way the author uses time is equally interesting and impressive from a craft persepctive. This starts from the first story, “Mariachi”, which is told in a seamless frame that starts with a single line of dialogue and resolves only in the final page. In “Mayan Dusk”, the iguana serves as a kind of timekeeper as well as a plot device, with the stages of its evolving relationship with the human characters aligning with the emotional stages of their journey. Overall, this is one of those collections I feel strong recommending on two levels, both as an enjoyable read and as a study in craft, especially for those writers looking to expand the way that they use time and voice in their short fiction.
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