A visionary novel about our interconnected world, about the collision of horror and humanity, from the Man Booker-shortlisted master of the spine-tingling tale
"Samanta Schweblin is the author of three story collections that have won numerous awards, including the prestigious Juan Rulfo Story Prize, and most recently, a Man Booker International Prize longlisting for Mouthful of Birds (Oneworld, 2019). Her debut novel Fever Dream was shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize in 2017. Originally from Buenos Aires, she lives in Berlin. Megan McDowell has translated books by many contemporary South American and Spanish authors, and her translations have been published in The New Yorker, Harper's and The Paris Review. She lives in Chile."
'Ingenious... An artful exploration of solitude and empathy in
a globalised world… In a nimble, fast-moving narrative, what’s most
impressive is the way she foregrounds her characters’ inner hopes
and fears.'
*Guardian*
'Disturbing... Schweblin enjoys hovering just above the normal.
Inspired by Samuel Beckett, she is interested in exposing
absurdities.'
*Financial Times*
‘Little Eyes makes for masterfully uneasy reading; it’s a book that
burrows under your skin.’
*Telegraph*
'I cannot remember a book so efficient in establishing character
and propelling narrative; there’s material for a hundred novels in
these deft, rich 242 pages... The writing, ably translated
from the Spanish by Megan McDowell, is superb, fully living up to
the promise of Schweblin's stunning previous novel, Fever Dream...
A slim volume as expansive and ambitious as an epic.'
*New York Times*
'A timely meditation on humanity and technology.'
*Harper's Bazaar*
'Little Eyes provides us with a powerful examination of the
underlining disparities that persist. It is a fable for a society
in which we are all made to feel simultaneously exposed and
anonymous, connected and alone.'
*Times Literary Supplement*
‘Little Eyes acts as a clear warning that every digital decision we
make has consequences... It does feel alarmingly real.’
*i*
'This dazzling inquiry into loneliness and connection...has been
given added resonance by the atomisation of lockdown.'
*Guardian, '50 Brilliant Books to Transport You This Summer'*
'A dark story, beautifully translated by Megan McDowell, it leaves
the reader in a world from which there is no escape, as it
questions our growing complicity in social media and neocapitalist
technologies.'
*Morning Star*
'Creepy as hell.'
*Weekend Sport*
‘Enjoyable reading… riffing on everyday human foibles – jealousy,
capriciousness, existential restlessness…the understatedly arch
tone is well served by Megan McDowell’s translation, which is so
slick that one hardly seems to be reading a translated work.’
*Literary Review*
'Daring and original... Schweblin deftly explores both the
loneliness and casual cruelty that can inform our attempts to
connect in this modern world.'
*Booklist*
'If you want a spookily prescient vision of human isolation
both assuaged and deepened by inscrutable, glitch-prone tech,
then Little Eyes more than fits the
brief... Adroitly served by Megan McDowell’s winningly deadpan
translation, these stories deal not in 'truly brutal plots' but
'desperately human and quotidian' urges, fears and scams... In
the middle of our stay-at-home, broadband-enabled apocalypse, that
feels right.'
*Spectator*
'The 'toys' Schweblin has created are the perfect hybrid between a
pet and a social network, enabling her to dissect problems that
touch all of our lives: the dark side of the internet; the global
epidemic of loneliness; the dumb inertia that leads us to jump
on board with the latest trend… As always in the worlds Schweblin
creates, the real monsters are to be found not in the outside
world, but inside each of us.'
*New York Times (Spanish edition)*
'A dystopian novel that is necessary, hypnotic, irresistible.'
*Elle Italia*
'This brilliant and disturbing book resembles Margaret Atwood’s
Handmaid’s Tale in how it speculates…Schweblin unspools a
disquieting portrait of the dark sides of connectivity and the
kinds of animalistic cyborgs it can make of us, as we walk through
barriers that even spirits cannot cross.'
*Literary Hub*
'The finest novel of the past five years. Quite
exceptional. Little Eyes will certainly feature in future
lists of the ten best novels of this century.'
*Luisgé Martín, author of The Same City*
'A nuanced exploration of anonymous connection and distant intimacy
in our heavily accessible yet increasingly isolated
lives...Capacious, touching, and disquieting, this is
not-so-speculative fiction for an overnetworked and underconnected
age.'
*Kirkus Reviews*
'Little Eyes by Samanta Schweblin, translated by Megan McDowell, is
a chilling and often hilarious book on the pitfalls of living in a
highly interconnected world. Schweblin has a true talent for
getting to the centre of our fears and drawing them out. An
intensely clever title that will have you examining your own
relationship to the internet.'
*Daisy Johnson, author of Sisters*
'This has a propulsive, Dave Eggers-ish readability.'
*Daily Mail*
'Little Eyes is a short, powerful, disquieting novel. The story
explores the grey area that constitutes an invasion of privacy, and
the line between intimacy and exhibitionism. Samanta Schweblin
guides the narrative with a skilful hand reminiscent of her very
finest short stories. An excellent storyteller, but above all, a
true writer.'
*La Razón*
'Readers will be fascinated by the kentuki-human interactions,
which smartly reveal how hungry we are for connection in a
technology-bent world. Of a piece with Schweblin’s elliptical Fever
Dream and the disturbing story collection Mouthful of Birds...this
jittery eye-opener will appeal to a wide range of readers.'
*Library Journal*
'Schweblin’s handling of tension and her viscously instantaneous
ironic twists, familiar from her short story collection Mouthful of
Birds, are delicious... An eerie sense of disjuncture
characterises the entire reading experience...an indicator of the
deep, discomforting place it has made itself under my skin.'
*3:AM magazine*
'Schweblin unfurls an eerie, uncanny story… Daring, bold, and
devious.'
*Publishers Weekly*
'Her most unsettling work yet – and her most realistic.'
*New York Times*
‘A master of the unsettling… the imaginary technology at the heart
of Little Eyes feels all too real, and Schweblin persuasively
elaborates its operations and implications… the novel’s breadth
provides much of its pleasure, allowing an inventiveness that
balances the bleakness of its characters’ lives.’
*The New Statesman*
'In Samanta Schweblin's fiendishly readable Little Eyes, the new
must-have tech gadget allows users to leapfrog into the lives of
strangers – a sharp idea that became even more pertinent with the
isolation and atomisation of lockdown.'
*Guardian, Best Fiction of 2020*
'Schweblin's clear and brisk language, aided by a seemingly
effortless translation from Spanish by Megan McDowell, drives home
the accessibility of this outlandish story. Little Eyes is strange
and addictive, an experience made even more frightening by how
familiar this feels.'
*Salon*
‘Alluring and unsettling in equal measure… A subtle and scathing
parody of modern communications technology and social media…
Colourful and near-hypnotic prose… A rare, yet powerful, indictment
of a society that tolerates and even encourages violations of one
of our most precious moral commodities – privacy.’
*E&T*
'She has a gift for fiction that is pure, original,
revelatory.'
*El País*
'Little Eyes calls to mind the world of Black Mirror. The result is
suffocating and addictive in equal measure; combining the minutiae
of domestic life with a picture of the dark side of technology in a
disconcertingly natural style. A story about voyeurism, and the
pleasure of looking at the world through someone else’s eyes.'
*El Mundo*
'An insightful reflection on solitude and privacy.'
*ABC*
'[Schweblin is] a literary explorer of 21st century fears.'
*La Vanguardia*
'Schweblin plunges herself once again into the disturbing limits of
what we think of as 'normal'.'
*Letras Libres*
'This isn’t science fiction; this is the here and now.'
*El Diario*
'Drawn in quotidian elegance, the novel is a string of nonstop,
colorful vignettes… If Schweblin’s sci-fi thriller Fever Dream made
sleep difficult, Little Eyes raises the unease quotient. The book
seems to watch viewers creepily as it unfolds.'
*BookPage*
'Like a true master, Schweblin manages to lure us in with a story
that leaves us both bruised and fascinated.'
*Culturas*
'The undisputed star of Latin American fiction.'
*ABC Sevilla*
'The fantastic and strange worlds of Samanta Schweblin’s work are
described with wisdom and ferocity.'
*La Repubblica*
'[Little Eyes is] yet another unsettling glimpse of
life...providing us with the disturbing psychological insights
which we associate with her work... Once again Schweblin has
produced a novel which is prescient and frightening in equal
measure.’
*1streading*
'Embedded within this novel of international interconnectivity are
questions of the exhibitionism and voyeurism tied up in our use of
technology. Expect echoes of the Wachowskis' Sense8,
except told with what has been characterized as Schweblin's
"neurotic unease."'
*The Millions, Most Anticipated Titles of 2020*
'Samanta Schweblin will injure you, however safe you may feel.'
*Jesse Ball, author of Census*
'Samanta Schweblin is one of the most promising voices in modern
literature.'
*Mario Vargas Llosa, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature*
'Little Eyes by Samanta Schweblin was pure sorcery. Hands
down, one of the best books of 2020 (so far)... I was
intoxicated.'
*The Book Satchel*
'In accentuating so many of the dangers of online communities, as
well as [the] advantages, Schweblin takes you on a psychological
journey that feels like a Black Mirror episode and has you
questioning actions that seemed mundane before.'
*The Book Slut*
'Brilliantly creepy.'
*New York Times, Notable Books of 2020*
'Little Eyes supposes a world that is our world, 5 minutes
from now... It then introduces one small thing — one little
change, one product, one tweaked application of a totally familiar
technology — and tracks the ripples of chaos that it
creates... Think for just a moment the kind of joy and the
kind of horror something like that would create. Then read Little
Eyes and see how whatever it was that you imagined was just the
beginning of how awful it could be.'
*NPR, Best Books of the Year*
'A smart and timely meditation on what the internet is doing
to the human soul... Funny, frightening and bound to make you turn
off your mobile.'
*Tablet, Summer reads*
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