sharing some books I read recently and recommend for women in translation month!
Two Sisters by Ngarta Jinny Bent & Jukuna Mona Chuguna (Translated from Walmajarri by Eirlys Richards and Pat Lowe)
The only known books translated from this Indigenous Australian language, tells sisters Ngarta and Jakuna's experience living in traditional Walmajarri ways.
2. Human Acts by Han Kang
(Translated from South Korean by Deborah Smith)
Gwangju, South Korea, 1980. In the wake of a viciously suppressed student uprising, a boy searches for his friend's corpse, a consciousness searches for its abandoned body, and a brutalised country searches for a voice.
3. Things We Lost in the Fire by Mariana Enriquez
(Translated from Spanish by Megan McDowell)
Short story collection exploring the realities of modern Argentina. So well written - with stories that are as engrossing and captivating as they are macabre and horrifying.
4. Portrait of an Unknown Lady by Maria Gainza
(Translated from Spanish by Thomas Bunstead)
In the Buenos Aires art world, a master forger has achieved legendary status. Rumored to be a woman, she seems especially gifted at forging canvases by the painter Mariette Lydis, a portraitist of Argentine high society. On the trail of this mysterious forger is our narrator, an art critic and auction house employee through whose hands counterfeit works have passed.
5. My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrente (Translated from Italian by Ann Goldstein)
My Brilliant Friend is a rich, intense and generous-hearted story about two friends, Elena and Lila. Through the lives of these two women, Ferrante tells the story of a neighbourhood, a city and a country as it is transformed in ways that, in turn, also transform the relationship between her two protagonists.
6. Childhood by Tove Ditlevsen
(Translated from Danish by Tiina Nunnally and Michael Favala Goldman)
Tove knows she is a misfit, whose childhood is made for a completely different girl. In her working-class neighbourhood in Copenhagen, she is enthralled by her wild, red-headed friend Ruth, who initiates her into adult secrets. But Tove cannot reveal her true self to her or to anyone else.
7. La Bastarda by Trifonia Melibea Obono
(Translated from Spanish by Lawrence Schimel)
The first novel by an Equatorial Guinean woman to be translated into English, La Bastarda is the story of the orphaned teen Okomo, who lives under the watchful eye of her grandmother and dreams of finding her father. Forbidden from seeking him out, she enlists the help of other village outcasts: her gay uncle and a gang of “mysterious” girls reveling in their so-called indecency. Drawn into their illicit trysts, Okomo finds herself falling in love with their leader and rebelling against the rigid norms of Fang culture.
8. Strange Beasts of China by Yan Ge (Translated from Chinese by Jeremy Tiang)
In the fictional Chinese city of Yong’an, an amateur cryptozoologist is commissioned to uncover the stories of its fabled beasts. Aided by her elusive former professor and his enigmatic assistant, our narrator sets off to document each beast, and is slowly drawn deeper into a mystery that threatens her very sense of self.
