Contos

Eça de Queirós wrote novels that shattered Portuguese society. These twelve stories, published two years after his death, prove he was equally devastating in miniature. Here you'll find the title tale about a blonde girl whose peculiarities drive a man to madness, a satirical sketch of 'Civilization' that skewers European pretensions, and 'Frei Genebro' a devilish tale of a monk who trades salvation for earthly delights. There's 'O Suave Milagre,' where the miraculous collides with the mundane, and 'Adão e Eva no Paraíso,' a wickedly funny retelling that reveals the absurdity behind biblical certainty. Throughout runs Queirós's signature gift: piercing the respectable surface of bourgeois life to expose vanity, longing, and the small tragedies that polite society refuses to name. His prose does things Portuguese had never seen. Sharp, funny, and occasionally heartbreaking, these stories showcase a writer who understood that the shortest distance between two people is usually a lie.