The Touch System, Paperback

Cat sitter, insomniac, former schoolteacher. Ania worries she is a "stand-in occupant," a substitute in her own life. When she receives a request from her father to visit her dying uncle Agustín in Argentina, she makes the long journey across the Andes from Chile to Campana, where her family immigrated from Italy. Her trip, one she used to make every summer with her father, will be an escape from the present and a journey to the borders of memory.

What follows is an ambitious portrait of alienation and belonging, and of two families and countries separated by a range of mountains. Threaded together with encyclopedia entries, pages from an old immigrant manual, typing class exercises, passages from children's books, half-faded photos, and letters mailed between continents, The Touch System introduces Alejandra Costamagna as one of the most powerful and subtle writers in contemporary Latin American literature.

About author(s):

Alejandra Costamagna was born in Santiago, Chile, in 1970. She is the author of four novels, four collections of short stories, and an anthology of newspaper columns. Her work has been translated into Italian, Korean and French, and since 2010, she has been a member of the editorial committee in the Chilean independent publishing house Cuneta. She lives in Santiago de Chile.

Lisa Dillman translates from Spanish and Catalan and teaches in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Emory University. Some of her recent translations include Such Small Hands by Andrés Barba, Signs Preceding the End of the World by Yuri Herrera, which won the Best Translated Book Award, and Monastery, co-translated with Daniel Hahn, by Eduardo Halfon. She lives in Decatur, GA.