Popular South American Magical Realism Books
Find magical realism books written by authors from South America for the next part of the Read Around The World Challenge. (42)
1.
A cabeça do santo by Socorro Acioli PT
Country: South America / 
Brazil
Brazil
Description:
Desenvolvido na oficina de Gabriel García Márquez, o romance de Socorro Acioli conta a história de um jovem que descobre possuir o fantástico dom de ouvir as preces das mulheres para santo Antônio. Pouco antes de morrer, a mãe de Samuel lhe faz um último pedido: que ele vá encontrar a avó e o pai que nunca conheceu. Mesmo contrariado, o rapaz cumpre a promessa e faz a pé o caminho de Juazeiro do Norte até a pequena cidade de Candeia, sofrendo todas as agruras do sol impiedoso do sertão do Ceará. Ao chegar àquela cidade quase fantasma, ele encontra abrigo num lugar curioso: a cabeça oca e gigan... continue
2.
A fúria : E outros contos by Silvina Ocampo PT
Country: South America / 
Argentina
Argentina
Description:
Os contos de Silvina Ocampo — monstruosos, insólitos, perturbadores, sinistros, irreais — são o tesouro mais bem guardado da literatura latino-americana do século XX. Finalmente vemos chegar ao Brasil um livro de Silvina Ocampo, que está entre os escritores mais surpreendentes e intensos do continente. Publicado em 1959, A fúria é considerado “o mais ocampiano” dos livros de Silvina, obra em que a autora encontra sua voz única e inaugura seu universo alucinado. “Nos seus contos há algo que não consigo compreender: um estranho amor por certa crueldade inocente e oblíqua”, escreveu o amigo Jorge... continue
3.
Bad Girls : A Novel by Camila Sosa Villada EN
Country: South America / Argentina
Argentina
Description:
Gritty and unflinching, yet also tender, fantastical, and funny, a trans woman’s tale about finding a community on the margins. In Sarmiento Park, the green heart of Córdoba, a group of trans sex workers make their nightly rounds. When a cry comes from the dark, their leader, the 178-year-old Auntie Encarna, wades into the brambles to investigate and discovers a baby half dead from the cold. She quickly rallies the pack to save him, and they adopt the child into their fascinating surrogate family as they have so many other outcasts, including Camila. Sheltered in Auntie Encarna’s fabled pink h... continue
4.
Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez EN
Country: South America / 
Colombia
Colombia
Description:
NOBEL PRIZE WINNER • From the author of One Hundred Years of Solitude comes the gripping story of the murder of a young aristocrat that puts an entire society—not just a pair of murderers—on trial. A man returns to the town where a baffling murder took place 27 years earlier, determined to get to the bottom of the story. Just hours after marrying the beautiful Angela Vicario, everyone agrees, Bayardo San Roman returned his bride in disgrace to her parents. Her distraught family forced her to name her first lover; and her twin brothers announced their intention to murder Santiago Nasar for dish... continue
5.
Collected Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges EN
Country: South America / Argentina
Argentina
Description:
For the first time in English, all the fiction by the writer who has been called “the greatest Spanish-language writer of our century” collected in a single volume A Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition From Jorge Luis Borges’s 1935 debut with The Universal History of Iniquity, through his immensely influential collections Ficciones and The Aleph, these enigmatic, elaborate, imaginative inventions display his talent for turning fiction on its head by playing with form and genre and toying with language. Together these incomparable works comprise the perfect one-volume compendium for all those who h... continue
6.
Cometierra by Dolores Reyes ES
Country: South America / Argentina
Argentina
Description:
Electrifying and provocative, visceral and profound, a powerful literary debut novel about a young woman whose compulsion to eat earth gives her visions of murdered and missing people--an imaginative synthesis of mystery and magical realism that explores the dark tragedies of ordinary lives. Set in an unnamed slum in contemporary Argentina, Earth-eater is the story of a young woman who finds herself drawn to eating the earth--a compulsion that gives her visions of broken and lost lives. With her first taste of dirt, she learns the horrifying truth of her mother's death. Disturbed by what she w... continue
7.
8.
Crooked Plow by Itamar Vieira Junior EN
Country: South America / Brazil
Brazil
Description:
Heralded as the most important Brazilian novel of the century so far, this bestseller's unique blend of magic and social realism won it three literary awards and global acclaim 'I heard our grandmother asking what we were doing.'"Say something!" she demanded, threatening to tear out our tongues. Little did she know that one of us was holding her tongue in her hand.' Deep in Brazil's neglected Bahia hinterland, two sisters find an ancient knife beneath their grandmother's bed and, momentarily mystified by its power, decide to taste its metal. The shuddering violence that follows marks their liv... continue
Peru