The People Who Report More Stress: Stories

Alejandro Varela is a renowned short story writer known for his tender and iconoclastic approach. His collection "The People Who Report More Stress" explores the anxieties of individuals living in the margins, navigating the stresses of modern life, and seeking connection in a complex world. The stories are interconnected, featuring characters facing challenges such as poverty, racism, and interpersonal conflicts. Varela's writing is characterized by its humor, sensuality, and deep insight into the human condition, leaving readers with a sense of frustration and empathy for the challenges faced by these characters.

Format: Hardback
Length: 256 pages
Publication date: 04 April 2023
Publisher: Astra Publishing House

Alejandro Varela is one of my favorite short story writers. He is an iconoclast of tenderness, a compass in the storm that this life always is. —Alexander Chee, author of How to Write an Autobiographical Novel The People Who Report More Stress dissects the minutiae of relationships to self, city, space, and sensibility so that we don't numbly succumb to the structured order of things. —Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore, author of The Freezer Door The People Who Report More Stress is a collection of interconnected stories brimming with the anxieties of people who retreat into themselves while living in the margins, acutely aware of the stresses that modern life takes upon the body and the body politic. In "Midtown-West Side Story," Álvaro, a restaurant worker struggling to support his family, begins selling high-end designer clothes to his co-workers, friends, neighbors, and the restaurant regulars in preparation for a move to the suburbs. "The Man in 512" tracks Manny, the childcare worker for a Swedish family, as he observes the comings and goings of an affluent co-op building, all the while teaching the children Spanish through Selena's music catalog. "Comrades" follows a queer man with radical politics who just ended a long-term relationship and is now on the hunt for a life partner. With little tolerance for political moderates, his series of speed dates devolve into awkward confrontations that leave him wondering if his approach is the correct one. A collection of humorous, sexy, and highly neurotic tales about parenting, long-term relationships, systemic and interpersonal racism, and class conflict from the author of The Town of Babylon, The People Who Report More Stress deftly and poignantly expresses the frustration of knowing the problems and solutions to our society's inequity.

Weight: 330g
Dimension: 148 x 218 x 24 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781662601071