Translated Fiction Reading Group

Welcome to our Translated Fiction reading group. Reading fiction in translation offers a whole new way of learning about the histories, cultures and literary traditions of different places, all while enjoying well-told stories and engaging with perspectives you might not find in works of non-fiction.

Each month, the group will read a book from a different country, translated into English, and our gatherings will be a chance for you to share your thoughts on the book and translated literature more generally in a relaxed and pressure-free setting.

For our September group, we’ll be reading Medea Sang Me a Corrido by Dahlia de la Cerda, translated by Julia Sanches and Heather Cleary.

Registering for the group costs £5 and once you've signed up, you can come into the shop to redeem your voucher against a copy of that month's book. After that, all that's left is to get reading!

N.B. We have a very limited amount of seats available to our reading groups, if for any reason your plans change, do let us know in advance so that we can offer the seat to the next person on the waiting list.

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A punk revival of Medea as a Mexican anti-angel of birth and death, from the International Booker Prize-nominated author of Reservoir Bitches.

In Northern Mexico, Paulina, Perla, Antonia, Reina, and Jordan are striving to survive the barrio, hustling on the edge of a cartel-run economy, nursing the wounds made normal in a world that eats its own. Hovering over their trials is a spirit with gothic flair, dressed in black and crowned with braids: Medea, a mythic mother of the Chihuahuan desert, ancient as the Aztecs but never too old to be petty.

From aiding a trophy girlfriend’s abortion, to accompanying a mother in her search for her lost child in the desert, to embracing those taken too soon in the narco’s brutal proxy wars, Medea fights for justice for her chosen mortals — her divine wrath the only power that could rival the corrupt, violent web spun by the cartel, the government, and the military. Dahlia de la Cerda’s magnetic prose draws readers right into the heart of that web and links all our fates to the missions of Medea, equal parts midwife and gravedigger, a femme fatale god in a femicidal world.