The Forgery
An artist races to finish his forgery of a masterpiece while held captive in surreal, menacing splendor.
José Federico Burgos is a failed painter turned forger trapped in surreal, an architectural masterpiece hidden behind high walls, an impish vagabond, and some very resourceful, very intimidating twins--Forgery pays homage to greats like Juan Rulfo and Luis Barragán, traversing late 20th Century Guadalajara with the exuberance and eccentricity of an 18th Century picaresque.
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"Ave Barrera eases us into this microcosmos as strange and shocking as it is true, constructing powerful atmospheres imbued with very varied sensations, ranging from dreamlike hallucinations to terror, horror and beauty." --El País
"We must pay serious attention to the work of Ave Barrera." --Cristina Rivera Garza, author of NO ONE WILL SEE ME CRY
"The plot flows in an intelligent and audacious way: It surprises by the simplicity and malice in which complex technical aspects are solved." --Geney Beltrán Félix
"A wild ride for protagonist and reader alike." --Kirkus
"A fun and entertaining story of a great literary quality." --Milenio
"Delightfully written, full of revelations ... Such a literary discovery." --Radio 3 (RTVE)
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Praise for Ave Barrera
"Restoration is a thriller, not only thematically but - equally powerful - stylistically: Ave Barrera writes the same way Min engages in her restoration work: taking care of every word, every detail, as if it were a question of 'contradicting death'." --Literal: Latin American Voices
"Perhaps the most terrifying novels of all are those that give us a clear and authentic reflection of ourselves." --Letras Libres
"The layers that make up this story range from the young protagonist's obsessive love for a man, the architectural process of restoring an old mansion, the ghosts of the past that inhabit each character, to a face-to-face dialogue with Farabeuf, the famous work by Salvador Elizondo." --Excelsior
"Nothing is gratuitous in this narrative with secret passages that each reader will make their own. We will have to follow this author. With this tremendous novel we have no choice." --Crash
"[Barrera] delves into the inadequacies, indulgence and regrets that accompany both women of today and the past: love as a construct and sometimes as a kind of sect that demands sacrifices from its most naive members." --Marvin
"The author pulls at both ends of the rope - between curiosity and fear, seduction and humiliation, sacrifice and revenge -and she does so with elegance, originality and intelligence." --La Razón de México
"Beautiful... tough... terrifying." --Tierra Adentro
"As with today's feminist struggles, our central character looks at the connection between past and present violence." --El Economista
"Ave Barrera carries out a meticulous architectural construction in which each element serves to support the others, using words with the care that a good craftsperson dedicates to the tools and materials necessary for a restoration." --La Marea
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