To read. The word that reached me before the book did: “molt bèstia”. Raw, brutal, uncomfortable.
Permagel (Club Editor, 2018) is the first novel by the Catalan poet Eva Baltasar, and the door into her trilogy, Tríptic. It won the Premi Llibreter and the Premi L’Illa dels Llibres. Written in Catalan (in English it’s Permafrost).
The protagonist sets the pattern for the three books: a solitary, awkward woman who loves women, wants no ties, no responsibilities and no ladder to climb, and runs from an absurd, unequal world to find her own kind of well-being alone. The prose has a reputation for being bodily and blunt.
I haven’t read it yet, so the verdict is borrowed. When I do: I’ll tell you if it’s as bèstia as they say.