BOOKSELLERS LOVE THE REVOLUTIONARIES TRY AGAIN
“The Revolutionaries Try Again is a daring novel that pits youthful idealism against persistent and inescapable corruption. Mauro Javier Cardenas is an exciting new voice in Latin American literature, and his debut crackles with an exuberance that readers of Valeria Luiselli, Julio Cortázar, and Horacio Castellanos Moya will love.”
—Stephen Sparks, Green Apple Books on the Park
“Written in rapid-fire, playful, musical prose, Mauro Javier Cardenas’s riot of a debut, The Revolutionaries Try Again, follows three longtime friends who are facing the evils of dictatorship in Ecuador. It’s one of my favorite books of 2016 and one I’m eager to share with other readers. I would tattoo lines from Mauro Javier Cardenas’s brilliant debut on my body.”
—Caitlin Luce Baker, University Book Store
“Fans of dense, brilliant, and mind-bending Latin American lit have a treat on their hands in September. The Revolutionaries Try Again is a marvel.”
—Mark Haber, Brazos Bookstore
“A tremendously skilled storyteller and monologuist; his writing is so exuberant.”
—Paul Yamazaki, Publishers Weekly
“The Revolutionaries Try Again transfixes on every page—across every world-devouring sentence—with a rigorous, incandescent language rarely seen in contemporary fiction. It’s a bit early to say, but Cardenas’s debut is either the jubilant beginning or the rapturous end of the Latin American novel: a fucking revelation of a book.”
—Hal Hlavinka, Community Bookstore
Copyright © 2016 by Mauro Javier Cardenas
Cover design by Carlos Esparza
Book design by Rachel Holscher
Author photograph © Victoria Smith
Coffee House Press books are available to the trade through our primary distributor, Consortium Book Sales & Distribution, cbsd.com or (800) 283-3572. For personal orders, catalogs, or other information, write to [email protected].
Coffee House Press is a nonprofit literary publishing house. Support from private foundations, corporate giving programs, government programs, and generous individuals helps make the publication of our books possible. We gratefully acknowledge their support in detail in the back of this book.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Cardenas, Mauro Javier, author.
Title: The revolutionaries try again / Mauro Javier Cardenas.
Description: Minneapolis : Coffee House Press, 2016.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016006300 | ISBN 9781566894470 (eBook)
Subjects: | BISAC: FICTION / Literary. | FICTION / Political.
Classification: LCC PS3603.A7346 R48 2016 | DDC 813/.6—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016006300
This novel is based, in part, on true events, but liberties have been taken with names, places, and dates, and the characters have been invented. Therefore, the persons and characters portrayed bear no resemblance whatsoever to the actual persons who were involved in the true events described in this novel.
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To Lilia & Klara
/ CONTENTS /
PART ONE: ANTONIO & LEOPOLDO
I / LEOPOLDO CALLS ANTONIO
II / ANTONIO IN SAN FRANCISCO
III / LEOPOLDO AND THE OLIGARCHS
IV / ANTONIO EDITS HIS BABY CHRIST MEMOIR
V / ANTONIO IN GUAYAQUIL
VI / ANTONIO’S GRANDMOTHER GIVES ADVICE
VII / ANTONIO & LEOPOLDO AT DON ALBAN’S
PART TWO: ROLANDO & EVA
VIII / ROLANDO & EVA
IX / ROLANDO LOOKS FOR EVA
PART THREE: DISINTEGRATION
X / ANTONIO AND THE PROTESTERS
XI / FACUNDO AT SAN JAVIER
XII / LEOPOLDO’S GRANDMOTHER GIVES ADVICE
XIII / LEOPOLDO & ANTONIO AT JULIO’S PARTY
XIV / EVA ALONG VICTOR EMILIO ESTRADA
XV / ROLANDO FINDS EVA
PART FOUR: FACUNDO SAYS FAREWELL
XVI / FACUNDO SAYS FAREWELL
XVII / ANTONIO EDITS HIS BABY CHRIST MEMOIR
XVIII / THE NIGHT BEFORE ALMA’S FIRST VOICE OF WITNESS INTERVIEW
—
Everyone’s saying that lightning struck the phone on Palm Sunday, Don Leopoldo. The one public phone at the Calderón that didn’t filch your coins. At least not all of them. That soon after hordes were pilgrimaging to it and lining up to dial their departed. That the single witness of the fateful strike, who’s the custodian at the Calderón — you know that park? The one by that gas station caught watering its diesel and dumping burnt Pennzoil in the Salado, imagine that, as if that river needed any more muck, a bit more and the stench won’t let us breathe, hopefully you don’t live by the Salado like I do, luckily León’s in charge and he’ll send someone to rinse it soon. That’s why I voted for your boss, Don Leopoldo, you know I’ve always voted for León. So the custodian hears thunder and sees lightning and he’s spooked. Brimming with liquor Patito, too. Apparently he’s known as a drunk and a troubadour. Little Jaramillo they call him over in El Guasmo. Apparently he serenaded his second wife at the Calderón and still shoulders his guitar to serenade the domestics that stroll by on Sundays. Cuando tú / te hayas ido / me envolverán / you know that pasillo by Julio Jaramillo?
An answer will only encourage Pascacio but no answer will not discourage him. Not that Leopoldo minds listening to him. Or that Pascacio doesn’t already know that Leopoldo doesn’t mind listening to him.
Las sombras?
That’s the one, Don Leopoldo. My Grandpa Lucho used to Pancho it for us while he fried his famous yapingachos. God keep him. He’ll never forget what you did for him. So while the rain’s pouring, Little Jaramillo’s