Will Sommer Pořadí knih (chronologicky)

In a United States not so unlike our own, the Department of Balance has adopted a radical new form of law enforcement: rather than incarceration, wrongdoers are given a second (and sometimes, third, fourth, and fifth) shadow as a reminder of their crime—and a warning to those they encounter. Within the Department, corruption and prejudice run rampant, giving rise to an underclass of so-called Shadesters who are disenfranchised, publicly shamed, and deprived of civil rights protections.Kris is a Shadester and a new mother to a baby born with a second shadow of her own. Grieving the loss of her wife and thoroughly unprepared for the reality of raising a child alone, Kris teeters on the edge of collapse, fumbling in a daze of alcohol, shame, and self-loathing. Yet as the kid grows, Kris finds her footing, raising a child whose irrepressible spark cannot be dampened by the harsh realities of the world. With a first-person register reminiscent of the fierce self-disclosure of Sheila Heti and the poetic precision of Ocean Vuong, I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself is a bold debut novel that examines the long shadow of grief, the hard work of parenting, and the power of queer resistance.

‘Detailed and impeccably researched. Eye-opening' GUARDIAN ‘Punchy and well- reported. Sommer is the perfect person to tell this story' NEW YORK TIMES

When Valeria, a forty-year-old Roman woman, develops an obsessive interest in keeping a secret diary, she cannot imagine that her habit will ultimately challenge the entire structure on which her life and her family's is based. For with writing comes the dangerous habit of questioning scrutiny. And from these questions, the docile, self-sacrificing woman sees herself and those about her in a disturbing new perspective: her husband, Michele, married too young to pursue his interests, in his fifties a failure, victimized by an embryonic dream; her daughter, defiant, emancipated, and strong, whom she loves, and hates in the manner of a mother approaching menopause who sees her beautiful daughter mature and take a lover; her son, Ricardo, emulating his father's failures; her employer, who falls in love with the image Valeria's new self-awareness projects; and Valeria, herself, always compliant to tradition and martyred to the demands of her family who loves her, but reflects her own indifference to her needs. In the end there is no escape and little comfort. The diary will be burned, for after all, even if despised, the chains of circumstance are binding. This meticulous account of a woman's mature consciousness is revealed quietly and undramatically, but with the certain force of verity. KIRKUS REVIEW