MONABy Pola OloixaracTranslated by Adam MorrisThis is a great moment, in contemporary letters, for crummy people. I’m not talking about Bernhardian antiheroes or protagonists who are hard to relate to. Their voices have generally been honed by Twitter to a rapier-sharp meanness, alternating between dismissive sneering and scrupulous sanctimony. Image Pola Oloixarac, author of “Mona.” Credit... Denise GiovanelliThe title character of “Mona,” a new novel by the Argentine writer Pola Oloixarac, might have been perfectly nice once, but we’ll never know it. Mona is brilliant, superficial, mysteriously bruised, exhibitionistic, insecure, vain and impossibly glamorous.

Source: International New York Times March 16, 2021 15:33 UTC