The debut novel of K-Ming Chang, Bestiary charts the lives of three Taiwanese-American women across the generations, eroding the line between reality and myth with unrelenting prose. Chang eradicates the borders between the real and unreal with heaps of blood and grime and bodily fluids, and her disgustingly intimate style shrinks not only the distance between dreams and reality but also the years between her characters. What seems like a paradox—a dreamlike, fabulous narrative brought to life with visceral, bodily imagery—is instead the crux of the novel. A way of submerging her protagonist within their history, their own body, their queerness. A way of throwing the reader in beside her and watching them sink like a stone.
Bestiary is out now via Harvill Secker (UK) and Oneworld (US). Buy it from your local independent bookshop or Bookshop.org.