I received this book in the mail (thanks to Catapult!) and had never heard of it, but I soon dove in when I read that it contained nine stories set in Chile. I'm familiar with Chilean literature via Isabel Allende, Roberto Bolaño, and Pablo Neruda—but nothing contemporary, or released recently. I was not disappointed. A remarkable debut collection, demonstrating a confidence in cutting the reader's expectations of where a story may go, or what the characters may do.

I'm fond of unsentimental writers, and Flores explores her characters with an edge rarely written. That sharpness used to a heady degree while she's displaying these tales of economic strife, children's perspectives, families in transition, and deceptive illusions of who people say they are. Each story contains some memorable turn, though I think my favorites were "Forgetting Freddy," "Talcahuano," "Humiliation," and "Teresa." And the rest of them.