Fever Dream - Samanta Schweblin

Shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize 2017

They’re like worms
What kind of worms?
Like worms all over
A young woman named Amanda lies dying in a rural hospital clinic. A boy named David sits beside her. She's not his mother. He's not her child. The two seem anxious and, at David's ever more insistent prompting, Amanda recounts a series of events from the apparently recent past.

As David pushes her to recall whatever trauma has landed her in her terminal state, he unwittingly opens a chest of horrors, and suddenly the terrifying nature of their reality is brought into shocking focus.

One of the freshest new voices to come out of the Spanish language, Samanta Schweblin creates an aura of strange and deeply unsettling psychological menace in this cautionary tale of maternal love, broken souls and the power and desperation of family.

The Man Booker International Prize judges comment: ‘Schweblin has written a strange but compelling narrative. The prose, brilliantly translated by Megan McDowell, is as mesmerising, magical and enchanting, as the strange and horrific tale it tells. This is amazing storytelling that seems to be reminding us of the uncomfortable truth that there are forces stronger than love, that love – no matter how powerful, no matter how closely guarded – cannot always protect those we love.’

Samanta Schweblin was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina in 1978 and lives in Berlin. In 2001, she was awarded first prize by both the National Fund for the Arts and the Haroldo Conti National Competition for her debut, El Núcleo del Disturbio. In 2008, she won the Casa de las Américas prize for her second collection of stories, Pájaros en la Boca. Two years later, she was listed among the Best of Young Spanish Writers by Granta magazine.

Megan McDowell has translated many modern and contemporary South American authors, including Alejandro Zambra, Arturo Fontaine, Carlos Busqued, Álvaro Bisama and Juan Emar. Her translations have been published in The New Yorker, McSweeney's, Words Without Borders, Mandorla, and Vice, among others. Born in Mississippi in 1978, she now resides in Chile.