Saga of Brutes
Ana Paula Maia, Alexandra Joy Forman (translation)Ana Paula Maia’s no-holds barred narrative pulls few punches, describing a shocking reality of the lives of the invisible workingmen who, like Atlas, are forced to carry society’s burdens. These heroes of vile circumstance—coal miners, firemen, garbage collectors, crematorium workers—are the soot-covered supermen who risk their lives performing difficult & dangerous work for others.
But in the end, they, too, amount to nothing but carbo animalis—notwithstanding the impure relation of coal to diamonds. Despite their straightforwardness, Ana Paula Maia’s stories are filled with great insight & compassion for the lives of the men who live on the edge of a society built with their own sweat.
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Ana Paula Maia (Brazil, 1977) is an author & scriptwriter & has published several novels, including O habitante das falhas subterráneas (2003), De gados e homens (2013), & the trilogy A saga dos brudos, comprising Entre rinhas de cachorros e porcos abatidos (2009), O trabalho sujo dos outros (2009) & Carvão animal (2011). Her novel A guerra dos bastardos (2007) won praise in Germany as among the best foreign detective fiction.
As a scriptwriter she has worked on a wide range of projects for television, cinema & theatre. The author won the São Paulo de Literatura Prize for Best Novel of the Year two years in a row: in 2018 for her novel Assim na Terra como embaixo da Terra, & in 2019 for Seus Mortos.
Alexandra Joy Forman is the author of Tall Slim & Erect: Portraits of the American Presidents & translator of Saga of Brutes by Ana Paula Maia & Brazilian author Hilda Hilst's first novel Phloem Flux. She lives in Rio de Janeiro.