u/sarajevo_marlboro

I just finished reading Alberto Laiseca’s Los sorias and wanted to share my review. Have you read it? Are you waiting for it to be translated into English?

Here’s the review, copied from my Storygraph:

 «¡TECNOCRACIA! ¡MONITOR! ¡TRIUNFO!» 

When I read The Untranslated's review of this novel and heard word that Editorial Barrett was bringing Los sorias back into print in 2024, I was intrigued. It had been decades since my years of high school Spanish. But knowing that in addition to Los sorias, some of my favorite literature in translation comes from the Spanish language, I set out to learn on Thanksgiving of 2024. I bought a copy of this novel, having it shipped all the way from Spain, before I could even read it. When it arrived and I had it in my hands, I knew I'd have to expend countless hours of effort before I'd be able to tackle this behemoth.

And so I did.

Today, nearly two years later, I've finished reading this beast, this leviathan, this Wagnerian epic that has held me captive for months. Was it worth it? The literal thousands of hours of prerequisite learning, reading, grammar exercises?

Absolutely.

Dale— onto a review proper:

Occupying some place in between science fiction, fantasy, pornography, and snuff films, Los sorias is a revelation. A novel as long and as intricately constructed as Los sorias can well be placed within the framework of the systems novel, the encyclopedic novel. While I understand why The Untranslated chalks this novel up as Latin America's answer to Gravity's Rainbow, personally I see it more as akin to Barth's Giles Goat-Boy in its self-contained parody-world. Even the metatextual conceit that this novel was written by el conde de la Laguna, who adds occasional annotations (and citations) in the form of footnotes is quite Barthian. Or perhaps Los sorias is what we'd get if War & Peace smoked DMT, Napoleon-as-Monitor not History on Horseback but rather History on Machine-Elf . . .

Laiseca has created a world unto its own: Eurisberia, which flickers between near-parity with our world and deliriously different, sometimes within a single sentence. Hilariously, when the tecnocrats discover there may be a country called "China", even though there have already been Chinese characters, they are shocked and stutter in disbelief; they thought those funny little fellows had been making that shit up the whole time . . . Laiseca has a wonderfully crude hand-drawn map of this world inserted relatively shortly into the novel. What's funny is that the title may have one thinking that Soria would be the focus of the novel, however it might be more aptly titled Los tecnocratas or even Los isekas, as Tecnocracia is the true magnetic core. But even that doesn't exactly feel correct either; the obstensible protagonist, Personaje Iseka, fades in and out of the narrative for extremely large stretches of the novel. By the end, I think the only character we could possibly call the protagonist would be our idiosyncratic Tecnocratic dictator, the Monitor.

1360 pages is a hell of a lot of space to fill, and fill it Laiseca does. Mostly with horrifying, disgusting, and hilarious antics. Throughout my reading of this tome, all the little tales and anecdotes I'd share with my friends had them scratching their heads, chuckling, never failing to remark something akin to "Just what the fuck are you reading, man?" This is certainly one of the most entertainingly bizarre books I've ever encountered. Laiseca is one sick puppy. All the insane torture methods, the sexual eccentricities of pretty much every single one of the novel's extensive cast, and some truly interesting blend of esotericisms that all the mages and wizards get up to all come together in a way that truly blew me away because, really, just who could've thought that jamming all of these (to borrow a Laisecan neologism) chichis together into a single novel could work, but it does. That's the most astonishing part about Los sorias. It all just works.

Politically, it’s easy to read Monitor as a Hitlerian figure, as the parallels are clear, but also as Caesarian— at one point reality even warps and Tecnocracia is Ancient Rome, Monitor is literally Caesar. The Soriator I find even more fascinating in that he (and the Soria he leads with an iron, necrophiliac fist) is some sort of syncretic fusion of Franco, the Falange, the CNT and other syndicalist groups, with some Peronist flavor thrown in for good measure, of course. Tecnocracia feels more akin to el Proceso de Reorganización Nacional, the Argentine military dictatorship that overthrew Isabel Perón's government.

Al fin y al cabo: Is Los sorias exhausting? Sí. Does it feel like it may be slightly overlong? Pues, possiblemente sí. Does the hundred-plus-page chapter where the homeless population of Tecnocracia (whom the Monitor believes to be magical beings, thus granting them special privileges in his country) build a giant replica of the Bayreuth Festspielhaus and perform Wagner's Ring Cycle make one wonder if they should've taken the time to learn German as well? Sí. Will you find yourself singing, in a horrendous rioplatense Borat voice, the dirty ditty «Qué conchaza tenía la vieja»? Jode, sí. Will you feel genuine sadness when magical maestro extraordinaire Decamerón de Gaula perishes during the siege of Monitoria, his magical prowess exploding and transforming him into a fossilized statue/powerful icon that his disciples must sing to in order to make their hammers and pickaxes capable of pulverizing into powder so the mages of Soria cannot obtain his body? Claro que sí, boludo, si tenés un corazón. Will Los sorias have you laughing your ass off on practically any given page? Sí, mil veces sí, a carcajadas.

I think above all this book is hilarious. In its absurdity, excess, and its sheer inventiveness. And even for all of its cruelties, you can always see Laiseca winking at you from behind the page. If you aren’t laughing, pues vos sos superchichi. Now onto El jardín de las máquinas parlantes.

—La verdad. Odio esa palabra. Mi padre solía decir en Retortillo: «¿Cuál es la verdad? Yo toda la vida la busqué. Siempre quise encontrar a alguien que me dijera qué es la verdad, pero nadie me constestó». Es ese tipo de puta pregunta abstracta, histérica y confusa, como «¿Qué es lo importante?». «¿Qué es la vida?». «¿Qué es el ser?». Etc. No tienen ni pueden tener respuesta, ya que no se refieren a cosas reales. Así: «¿Qué es la verdad?». Con todo el sentido ambiguo, mentiroso y epiléptico que se le da a esta expresión.

currently rereading (aunque esta vez en castellano!) one of my favorites. Mariana Enríquez is a gem. although most of her works are gothic as hell (looking at you, Bajar es lo peor), Nuestra parte de noche has an intoxicating culty intrigue in addition to the supernatural elements present in many of her short stories.

anyone have any recommendations for works (in english or español) that feel similarly? the dirty war, an evil cult, mediums, the claws of the living god— i’d love to read more like this afterwards.

has anyone else read Ann Quin? about 75% of the way done with Berg, which is her first novel and also the first of her’s that i’ve read. the way she weaves the narrator’s schizo inner monologue with third person indirect discourse for the other characters all the while plodding along the novel’s actual action is pretty thrilling.

a bit surprised that i haven’t seen more bizarre, disorienting, and genuinely experimental literature written by women on this sub. no shade but upmarket bookclub slop just isn’t my jam.