Begins as entertaining slapstick, subtly metamorphoses into fable. . . . As [the narrator’s] vivid imaginary world fuses with reality this deceptively ethereal novel advances toward a dark and startling finale.
From the Shadows
Laid off from his job, Damián Lobo obsessively imagines himself as a celebrity being interviewed on TV. After committing an act of petty theft at an antiques market, he finds himself trapped inside a wardrobe and delivered to the seemingly idyllic home of a husband, wife, and their internet-addicted teenage daughter. There, he sneaks from the shadows to serve as an invisible butler, becoming deeply and disastrously involved with his unknowing host family. Every thread of the plot is ingeniously tied together, creating a potent admixture of parable, love story, and thriller. Millás masterfully reveals the everyday as innately surreal as he renders the unbelievable tangible and the trivial fantastical, and full of dark humor.
From the Shadows is translated from the Spanish by Thomas Bunstead and Daniel Hahn.
Publishers Weekly “Top 10 Books of the Year” selection
Thrillist “Best Books of the Year” selection
World Literature Today “Notable Translations of the Year” selection
Asymptote Book Club selection
Crime Reads “Great Novels Where Things Disappear” selection
Words Without Borders “Watchlist” selection
Big Other Book Award Finalist
Literary Hub “Booksellers’ Year in Reading” selection
Powell’s Books “Favorite Books of the Year” selection
Island Books Staff Pick
New York Public Library “Contemporary Classics Book Discussion” selection
North Canton Public Library “Adult Summer Reading” selection
Paperback
- ISBN
- 9781942658665
Ebook
- ISBN
- 9781942658672
Join the Asymptote Book Club discussion about Juan José Millás’s “spectacularly surreal and cerebral” novel From the Shadows and read more about Thomas Bunstead and Daniel Hahn’s co-translation process.
“Features one of the most memorable closets since C.S. Lewis’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.” Publishers Weekly interviews “Writer to Watch” Juan José Millás about his North American debut novel From the Shadows.
Designer Tree Abraham discusses the evolution of the From the Shadows cover art with Spine Magazine.
Juan José Millás is a bestselling Spanish author and recipient of Spain’s most prestigious literary prizes: the Premio Nadal, Premio Planeta, and Premio Nacional de Narrativa. He is the author of several short story collections and works of nonfiction as well as over a dozen novels, including three published in North America: From the Shadows, Let No One Sleep, and Only Smoke. A regular contributor to El País, Millás has also won many awards for his journalism. He lives in Madrid.
visit author page »Praise for From the Shadows
Spectacularly surreal and cerebral. . . . [From the Shadows] carves a labyrinthine path through a mind withstanding both physical and mental confinements, and the language, rife with darkness and comedy, traces the fine walls of worlds both real and imagined with Kafkaesque soliloquy.
An entertainingly presented look at social isolation and dependency.
— Complete Review
A strange, delightful, weird little book!
— Mark Haber, Brazos Bookstore (Houston, TX)
Creepy and completely immersive. I couldn’t help but become an audience member in the narrator’s fantasy world.
— Kari Bingham-Gutierrez, Olathe Public Library (Olathe, KS)