Among Strange Victims

Among Strange Victims], I felt I was witnessing a great performance. It reminded me a little of young Mozart showing off at the emperor’s golden harpsichord, giggling and improvising variations on Salieri’s welcome march, startling all the wigged and powdered Viennese stiffs. And I sensed something desperate and inflamed in the writing too, as though the author assumed all along that nobody would ever read his book. That’s probably what I like most about it—the cocky, indulgent, nihilistic virtuosity.” —BOMB “Quirky and absurd, it’s a funny, shambling look at the benefits (and drawbacks) of living life at your own lazy pace.” —Men’s Journal “The English debut by the young and talented Daniel Saldaña Paris, Among Strange Victims is the definitive millennial existentialist novel of Mexico City.” —The Culture Trip “Saldaña París writes with a gifted and confident prose that is as much the star of this singular novel as its unforgettable characters and delighting plot. This young Mexican writer (and poet, too) is surely one to watch, and if Among Strange Victims is but a harbinger of what’s to come, then Saldaña París may well have a long, fruitful, and fantastic career ahead of himself.” —Jeremy Garber, Powell’s Books “Critics have drawn comparisons between París’s latest novel (his first to be translated in the United States) and the work of his blockbuster predecessor, Roberto Bolaño.” —Brooklyn Magazine “Daniel Saldaña París, following in the tradition of di Lampedusa, shows that non-writers—that is to say, those who don’t exclusively cultivate what’s known as a literary life—are the ones who make the best books.” —Mario Bellatin “I rewrote the first forty pages of Among Strange Victims several times over two years before finding the right tone for it. It started being a very serious, philosophical novel, but with each new version it became more and more humorous.” —The Quarterly Conversation