A Working Woman

Acclaimed as a meticulous explorer of the psyche’s most obscure alleyways, Elvira Navarro here gives us a novel of feminine friendship, potent sexuality, madness, and the vulnerability that makes us reveal our most shameful secrets. It begins as Elisa transcribes the ravings of her roommate Susana, acting as part-therapist, part-confessor while this odd woman recounts the shocking tale of her gay dwarf boyfriend, the only person who will fulfill her singular sexual appetites. But is she telling the truth? And what to make of Elisa’s strange account of her difficult relationship with Susana, one that blends her ambitions as a writer with her deep need for catharsis? And in one final surprise, A Working Woman concludes with a curious epilogue that makes us question everything we have just read. With her penchant for finding the freakish side of the everyday, and her precisely timed, mordant sentences, Navarro’s most successful novel to-date masterfully uncovers the insecurity lurking just beneath the surface of every stable life.