Cecilia
K-Ming Chang
(Author)
Description
An erotic, surreal novella from the author of Organ Meats and Bestiary. Seven, who works as a cleaner at a chiropractor's office, reencounters Cecilia, a woman who has obsessed her since their school days. As the two of them board the same bus--each dubiously claiming not to be following the other--their chance meeting spurs a series of intensely vivid and corporeal memories. As past and present bleed together, Seven can feel her desire begin to unmoor her from the flow of time. Smart, subversive, and gripping, Cecilia is a winding, misty road trip through bodily transformation, the inextricable histories of violence and love, and the ghosts of girlhood friendship.
Product Details
Price
$14.95
$13.90
Publisher
Coffee House Press
Publish Date
May 21, 2024
Pages
144
Dimensions
4.33 X 6.85 X 0.63 inches | 0.25 pounds
Language
English
Type
Paperback
EAN/UPC
9781566897075
Earn by promoting books
Earn money by sharing your favorite books through our Affiliate program.
Become an affiliate
About the Author
K-Ming Chang is a Kundiman fellow, a Lambda Literary Award winner, a National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 honoree, and an O. Henry Prize winner. She is the author of Bestiary (One World/Random House, 2020), Bone House (Bull City Press, 2021), Gods of Want (One World, 2022), and Organ Meats (One World, 2023). Her books have been New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice selections, included on the New York Times Notable Books list, and considered for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize and the PEN/Faulkner Award. She can be found at kmingchang.com.
Reviews
Praise for Cecilia Literary Hub, "Most Anticipated Books of 2024"
Bookshop.org "100 Most Anticipated Books of 2024"
Autostraddle "69 Most Anticipated Queer Books for Spring 2024"
Bustle "This Spring's 44 Most Anticipated Books"
"The work of reading this book leaves the reader with the same feeling one has after eating a particularly indulgent meal--satiation, with the knowledge of more hunger to come." --Kirkus Reviews "A surreal cascade of girlhood memories about desire, queerness, and obsession. Cecilia is at once erotic and repulsive, carnal and tasty. In a word: delicious." --McKayla Coyle, Literary Hub "Bound to be surreal and sexy like all of Chang's work." --Autostraddle "Erotic and strange, captivating and twisted: This one's for the freaks (complimentary)." --Bustle "K-Ming Chang's spell-binding tale of queer desire moved me to tears by the end. Seven's obsession with Cecilia is rendered through lyrical prose that startled and disarmed me, reminding me of how vulnerable and frightening it is to want someone you are destined to lose. The narrative voice got under my skin and I couldn't stop thinking about the characters' fierce hunger for the freedom to be themselves." --Nghiem Tran "The fantastic and the mundane marry each other like crows on the phantasmagoric pages of Cecilia. K-Ming Chang's work is bioluminescent and breathtaking. Sharply written and ecologically aware, Cecilia is a magnificent, magical work that will redefine speculative writing for years to come." --Vi Khi Nao "An incendiary look at desire's ability to bind and destroy. Fierce, erotic, devastating: Cecilia is a work of genius." --Brynne Rebele-Henry "Cecilia is one of those rare reads bursting with staggering imagination and poetry that makes you feel you're having an out-of-body experience with the turn of every page. Not only that, it's also incredibly profound, often disturbing and funny." --Fernando A. Flores "Rowdy and razor-sharp, luminescent and enchanting, K-Ming Chang is an utter master of the strange intimacies of the body. To read her work feels like shining a flashlight, finally, on the secret desires and aches that you've always wanted to glimpse." --Alexandra Kleeman Past Praise: Praise for Bestiary Finalist for the Lambda Literary Award
Longlisted for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award
Longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize "Full of magic realism that reaches down your throat, grabs hold of your guts and forces a slow reckoning with what it means to be a foreigner, a native, a mother, a daughter--and all the things in between."--The New York Times Book Review Praise for Gods of Want Winner of the Lambda Literary Award "In the genre of feminine madness, these stories are to be worshiped. They are fearless, hysterical, violent yet full of grace. Each sentence escalates toward devastating, poetic insight about our bodies, about cultural demands both treasured and feared, and about what makes being alive a terror and a joy." --Venita Blackburn "These stories glitter and pulse, announcing Chang, with her second book, as a front-runner of innovation anew. Full of mythic desire, joy and pain disguised as the other, and navigating the precarious balance of how to belong to a land while still belonging to oneself, Gods of Want is bursting with language and images so striking, so sure of their own strength, I found myself stunned. The worlds and characters depicted in these pages are original, strange, sometimes horrific, and all the more gorgeous because of it." --Dantiel Moniz "The beauty, humor, and brilliance throughout Gods of Want shines brightly from story to story--Chang's collection is constantly illuminating and thoroughly astounding. K-Ming Chang's mastery of language, and the boundlessness of her empathy, make for a strange, hilarious, and unforgettable read. Gods of Want is a gift and a masterclass, a stunning and moving work by one of our most brilliant authors." --Bryan Washington Praise for K-Ming Chang National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 "[K-Ming Chang] rewrites the world as a place of radical transformation." --The New York Times Book Review
Bookshop.org "100 Most Anticipated Books of 2024"
Autostraddle "69 Most Anticipated Queer Books for Spring 2024"
Bustle "This Spring's 44 Most Anticipated Books"
"The work of reading this book leaves the reader with the same feeling one has after eating a particularly indulgent meal--satiation, with the knowledge of more hunger to come." --Kirkus Reviews "A surreal cascade of girlhood memories about desire, queerness, and obsession. Cecilia is at once erotic and repulsive, carnal and tasty. In a word: delicious." --McKayla Coyle, Literary Hub "Bound to be surreal and sexy like all of Chang's work." --Autostraddle "Erotic and strange, captivating and twisted: This one's for the freaks (complimentary)." --Bustle "K-Ming Chang's spell-binding tale of queer desire moved me to tears by the end. Seven's obsession with Cecilia is rendered through lyrical prose that startled and disarmed me, reminding me of how vulnerable and frightening it is to want someone you are destined to lose. The narrative voice got under my skin and I couldn't stop thinking about the characters' fierce hunger for the freedom to be themselves." --Nghiem Tran "The fantastic and the mundane marry each other like crows on the phantasmagoric pages of Cecilia. K-Ming Chang's work is bioluminescent and breathtaking. Sharply written and ecologically aware, Cecilia is a magnificent, magical work that will redefine speculative writing for years to come." --Vi Khi Nao "An incendiary look at desire's ability to bind and destroy. Fierce, erotic, devastating: Cecilia is a work of genius." --Brynne Rebele-Henry "Cecilia is one of those rare reads bursting with staggering imagination and poetry that makes you feel you're having an out-of-body experience with the turn of every page. Not only that, it's also incredibly profound, often disturbing and funny." --Fernando A. Flores "Rowdy and razor-sharp, luminescent and enchanting, K-Ming Chang is an utter master of the strange intimacies of the body. To read her work feels like shining a flashlight, finally, on the secret desires and aches that you've always wanted to glimpse." --Alexandra Kleeman Past Praise: Praise for Bestiary Finalist for the Lambda Literary Award
Longlisted for the VCU Cabell First Novelist Award
Longlisted for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize "Full of magic realism that reaches down your throat, grabs hold of your guts and forces a slow reckoning with what it means to be a foreigner, a native, a mother, a daughter--and all the things in between."--The New York Times Book Review Praise for Gods of Want Winner of the Lambda Literary Award "In the genre of feminine madness, these stories are to be worshiped. They are fearless, hysterical, violent yet full of grace. Each sentence escalates toward devastating, poetic insight about our bodies, about cultural demands both treasured and feared, and about what makes being alive a terror and a joy." --Venita Blackburn "These stories glitter and pulse, announcing Chang, with her second book, as a front-runner of innovation anew. Full of mythic desire, joy and pain disguised as the other, and navigating the precarious balance of how to belong to a land while still belonging to oneself, Gods of Want is bursting with language and images so striking, so sure of their own strength, I found myself stunned. The worlds and characters depicted in these pages are original, strange, sometimes horrific, and all the more gorgeous because of it." --Dantiel Moniz "The beauty, humor, and brilliance throughout Gods of Want shines brightly from story to story--Chang's collection is constantly illuminating and thoroughly astounding. K-Ming Chang's mastery of language, and the boundlessness of her empathy, make for a strange, hilarious, and unforgettable read. Gods of Want is a gift and a masterclass, a stunning and moving work by one of our most brilliant authors." --Bryan Washington Praise for K-Ming Chang National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 "[K-Ming Chang] rewrites the world as a place of radical transformation." --The New York Times Book Review
