Rage » (Translatio)

Novelist, playwright, poet, and screenwriter, the Argentinian writer Sergio Bizzio has already made his own debut as a film director with "Animals", which received the Opera Prima award for Best Screenplay from the National Institute of Cinematography in Argentina. His short story "Cinismo" was made into a film. "Rage" is his sixth novel. Amanda Hopkinson is a well known literary translator, most recently of The Devil and Miss Prym by Paulo Coelho, Money to Burn by Ricardo Piglia and Dead Horsemeat by Dominique Manotti.

Crime and erotic fantasy meet in a vitriolic portrait of Buenos Aires society.

Publishers Weekly

Starred Review.

This surprisingly moving novel shows that in the hands of the right author almost any setup can be invested with depth and emotion. Construction worker José María Negro falls for Rosa Verga, a housemaid for an affluent Buenos Aires family, whom he meets at a grocery. Their relationship blossoms, despite Negro's struggles to control his explosive temper. His anger gets the best of him, unfortunately, and he bludgeons his foreman to death. Negro comes up with the idea of squatting on the upper floor of the villa where his lover works, and lives vicariously through his observations of Verga and her employer's family. Remarkably, Bizzio manages to make the creepy voyeur sympathetic, despite his murderous nature and his growing detachment from reality. The powerful prose and characters make a strong case for English translations of the Argentinian author's six other novels. The forthcoming film adaptation by Guillermo del Toro should boost sales.
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