The Entre Ríos Trilogy

“A mesmerizing narrative of life in the Argentine province of Entre Ríos where many Jews from Eastern Europe settled at the turn of the 20th century. Perla Suez narrates with passion and audacity life in this region, where violence and identity are intertwined with love and the possibilities of belonging in a foreign land.” —Marjorie Agosin 

“Memory, personal and collective, is the engine behind The Entre Ríos Trilogy. Perla Suez returns mercilessly to traumatic moments in Argentine Jewish history: the immigration at the end of the nineteenth century, the pogrom in 1919 known as Semana trágica, the quest of the grandchildren of immigrants to find a home, and the perfunctory nature of anti-Semitism. Figuratively, Suez is a descendant of Gerchunoff: a dreamer, a language wizard.” — Ilán Stavans 

“Suez’s minimalist narratives have profound traces in the other side of the tapestry of what, in the end, is still very much a powerful and significant presence of Jews in Argentina. Indeed, Suez’s three novels are exercises in reading those backside traces. They are, in the best feminist tradition, stories told from women’s point of view in the attempt to bring forth the way in which social history, so often forged consciously and unthinkingly by men oblivious to women’s participation in it, impacts on women’s consciousness. The fact that the consciousness of Suez’s characters is that of humble peasant girls or young women only makes them that much more eloquent: stream-of-conscious narrative, oblique witnessing, barely perceptive understanding are all features of these three texts, while at the same time Suez is able to transmit the literal burden of history – Argentine history, Jewish history, Argentine-Jewish history – of each of her characters, both in the first person and in the third person experiences. This is a superb account of women’s lives that are important in their public obscurity, and Buchanan’s translation is flawless.” —David William Foster

“Buchanan’s masterful translation succeeds in capturing the author’s careful pacing of the text, economy of language, and the lyrical nature of her writing. As a trilogy, the novellas offer a powerful resistance against the socio-cultural invisibility of the Jewish immigrant populations, as well as a significant contribution to the literature of marginalization and exile.” —Karen Wooley Martin