Woodworm
Layla Martinez author Annie McDermott translator Sophie Hughes translator
Format:Hardback
Publisher:Vintage Publishing
Published:2nd May '24
£14.99
Available for immediate dispatch.
‘Tense, chilling’ Mariana Enriquez, author of Our Share of Night
'Lays bare intergenerational horror, feminine rage and the taking back of power' Stylist
The house breathes.
The house contains bodies and secrets.
The house is visited by ghosts, by angels that line the roof like insects, and by saints that burn the bedsheets with their haloes.
It was built by a small-time hustler as a means of controlling his wife, and even after so many years, their daughter and her granddaughter can’t leave.
They may be witches or they may just be angry, but when the mysterious disappearance of a young boy draws unwanted attention, the two isolated women, already subjects of public scorn, combine forces with the spirits that haunt them in pursuit of something that resembles justice.
Layla Martínez’s eerie debut novel Woodworm is class-conscious horror that drags generations of monsters into the sun.
Translated by Sophie Hughes and Annie McDermott
This supernatural story of an outcast girl and her grandmother lays bare intergenerational horror, feminine rage and the taking back of power. * Stylist *
A house of women and shadows, built from poetry and revenge. Layla Martínez’s tense, chilling novel tells a story of specters, class war, violence and loneliness, as naturally as if the witches had dictated this lucid, terrible nightmare to Martínez themselves. -- Mariana Enriquez, author of OUR SHARE OF THE NIGHT
It pounces on us from the first line and doesn’t let go until the last, if it lets go. The Gothic revival continues to expand and produce great works. -- Edmundo Paz Soldán, author of NORTE
Woodworm is a true literary event. -- Belén Gopegui, author of Stay This Day and Night with Me
This book is the revenge of an intergenerational wound, the embrace of barbarity, the loss of morals when trying to protect your loved ones. This book is the miserable and the wretched saying ‘enough is enough.’ -- Alana S. Portero, author of BAD HABIT
ISBN: 9781787303973
Dimensions: 205mm x 135mm x 17mm
Weight: 228g
144 pages