Search results for ""author ivan monalisa ojeda""

In this acclaimed story collection, Chilean transgender performer and author Ivan Monalisa Ojeda delivers an irreverent, honest and full-throated love song to New York City from the perspective of a group of trans Latinx immigrant friends who walk the streets, smoke crystal meth, compete in beauty contests, look for clients on their impossibly high heels, and fall prey to increasingly cruel immigration policies. Drawing from his/her own experience as a trans performer, sex worker, and undocumented immigrant, Ivan Monalisa Ojeda chronicles the lives of Latinx queer and trans immigrants in New York City. Whether she is struggling with addiction, clashing with law enforcement, or is being subjected to personal violence, each character choses her own path of defiance, often responding to her fate with with irreverent dark humor. What emerges is the portrait of a group of friends who express unquestioning solidarity and love for each other, and of an unfamiliar, glittering and violent, New York City that will draw readers in and swallow them whole. On every page, Ivan Monalisa's unique narrative talent is on display as he/she artfully transforms the language of the streets, making it his/her own -- rich with rhythm and debauchery. This bold new collection positions Ojeda as a fresh and necessary voice within the canon of world literature.

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'An ode to New York City's queer and trans immigrant community... Ojeda, a Chilean American writer, brings sincerity and dark humor to tales of drug addiction, prison life at Rikers Island and a five-time beauty pageant winner, drawing from personal experience as a trans performer, sex worker and undocumented immigrant'New York Times'Can't get enough of Pose? Then Las Biuty Queens will be your new fave read... Ivan Monalisa Ojeda sparkles as one of 2021's boldest new writers' Cosmopolitan 'The American dream as seen from the height of a good pair of heels' Pedro AlmodóvarLas Biuty Queens: a group of trans Latinx immigrant friends who walk the streets of New York, smoke crystal meth, compete in beauty contests, look for clients on their impossibly high heels and fall prey to increasingly cruel immigration policies.Drawing from his/her own perspective as a trans performer, sex worker and undocumented immigrant, acclaimed Chilean writer Iván Monalisa Ojeda shines a light on a group of friends trying to survive the dark side of the American Dream and introduces readers to an unfamiliar, glittering and violent New York City that will draw them in and swallow them whole.'This is New York, full of beauty and pain - turn away at your own peril'Nick Flynn, author of Another Bullshit Night in Suck City'You can't just read this book; you bathe in its grit, the resilience of its characters and, most of all, its beauty. Stunning'Jose Antonio Vargas, author of Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen

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