{"title":"Books by Juan Pablo Villalobos","description":null,"products":[{"product_id":"9781913505363","title":"Invasion of the Spirit People","description":"\u003cp\u003eJuan Pablo Villalobos’s fifth novel adopts a gentle, fable-like tone, approaching the problem of racism from the perspective that any position as idiotic as xenophobia can only be fought with sheer absurdity.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn an unnamed city, colonised by an unnamed world power, an immigrant named Gastón makes his living selling exotic vegetables to eateries around the city. He has a dog called Kitten, who’s been diagnosed with terminal cancer, and a good friend called Max, who’s in a deep depression after being forced to close his restaurant. Meanwhile, Max’s son, Pol, a scientist away on a scientific expedition into the Arctic, can offer little support.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eGastón begins a quest, or rather three: he must search for someone to put his dog to sleep humanely; he must find a space in which to open a new restaurant with Max; and he must look into the truth behind the news being sent back by Pol: that human life may be the by-product of an ancient alien attempt at colonisation . . . and those aliens might intend to make a return visit.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":43205844304050,"sku":"9781913505363","price":11.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781913505363.jpg?v=1786030366"},{"product_id":"9781908276742","title":"I’ll Sell You a Dog","description":"\u003cp\u003eLong before he was the taco seller whose ‘Gringo Dog’ recipe made him famous throughout Mexico City, our hero was an aspiring artist: an artist, that is, till his would-be girlfriend was stolen by Diego Rivera, and his dreams snuffed out by his hypochondriac mother. Now our hero is resident in a retirement home, where fending off boredom is far more gruelling than making tacos. Plagued by the literary salon that bumps about his building’s lobby and haunted by the self-pitying ghost of a neglected artist, Villalobos’ old man can’t help but misbehave. He antagonises his neighbours, tortures American missionaries with passages from Adorno, flirts with the revolutionary greengrocer, and in short does everything that can be done to fend off the boredom of retirement and old age . . . while still holding a beer. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA delicious take-down of pretensions to cultural posterity, \u003ci\u003eI’ll Sell You a Dog\u003c\/i\u003e is a comic novel whose absurd inventions, scurrilous antics and oddball characters are vintage Villalobos.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56308776042869,"sku":"9781908276742","price":10.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781908276742_1aa7089a-ee9e-4e8c-b216-16185d4b5b2f.jpg?v=1786029453"},{"product_id":"9781911508489","title":"I Don't Expect Anyone to Believe Me","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWinner of the 2016 Herralde Prize\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e“I don’t expect anyone to believe me,” warns the narrator of this novel, a Mexican student called Juan Pablo Villalobos. He is about to fly to Barcelona on a scholarship when he’s kidnapped in a bookshop and whisked away by thugs to a basement. The gangsters are threatening his cousin—a wannabe entrepreneur known to some as “Projects” and to others as “dickhead”—who is gagged and tied to a chair. The thugs say Juan Pablo must work for them. His mission? To make Laia, the daughter of a corrupt politician, fall in love with him. He accepts. . . . though not before the crime boss has forced him at gunpoint into a discussion on the limits of humour in literature. \u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e Part campus novel, part gangster thriller, \u003ci\u003eI Don’t Expect Anyone to Believe Me\u003c\/i\u003e is Villalobos at his best. Exuberantly foul-mouthed and intellectually agile, this hugely entertaining novel finds the light side of difficult subjects—immigration, corruption, family loyalty and love—in a world where the difference between comedy and tragedy depends entirely on who’s telling the joke.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003ePraise for Juan Pablo Villalobos:\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Funny, convincing, appalling...a punch-packer.' \u003cb\u003eAli Smith\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e'Savagely funny.' \u003cb\u003eLili Wright, \u003c\/b\u003e\u003ci\u003e\u003cb\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56309052866933,"sku":"9781911508489","price":11.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781911508489_b19ca485-700d-400e-899d-4a805ed80876.jpg?v=1786028993"},{"product_id":"9781913505578","title":"Down the Rabbit Hole","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eShortlisted for the 2011 Guardian First Book Award and the 2012 Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Prize\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eTochtli lives in a palace. He loves hats, samurai, guillotines and dictionaries, and what he wants more than anything right now is a new pet for his private zoo: a pygmy hippopotamus from Liberia. But Tochtli is a child whose father is a drug baron on the verge of taking over a powerful cartel, and Tochtli is growing up in a luxury hideout that he shares with hit men, prostitutes, dealers, servants and the odd corrupt politician or two.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cem\u003eDown the Rabbit Hole\u003c\/em\u003e, a masterful and darkly comic first novel, is the chronicle of a delirious journey to grant a child’s wish.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":56309124989301,"sku":"9781913505578","price":10.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781913505578_5bf4ae05-64a5-4508-86b1-54ca94e96190.jpg?v=1786035000"},{"product_id":"past-pursues-us-like-detectives-debt-collectors-thieves","title":"The Past Pursues Us Like Detectives, Debt Collectors, Thieves","description":"\u003cp\u003eAfter many peaceful years abroad, JP has returned home to Mexico to visit family and help care for his elderly mother. Instead, however, he finds himself at a bar, his fist inches from the face of Everardo, his sort-of childhood friend. He lands the blow and runs home. But when Everardo turns up dead the next morning, JP soon finds himself blamed for a murder that he (probably) didn't commit. What’s going on? Can Lagos really be more full of drugs, extortion, and fraud than when he left? Why is everyone offering him pills? How's he ever going to pay for his mother's medical treatment? It wasn't even that good a punch!\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eWeaving outright hilarity with wry tenderness, \u003cem\u003eThe Past Pursues Us\u003c\/em\u003e is a fast-paced and funny whodunit that lovingly speaks to the stories we tell ourselves about home: about what changes, what doesn't, and what should.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Gardners","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57492164968821,"sku":"9781916751453","price":14.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0612\/7193\/3106\/files\/9781916751453.jpg?v=1786528988"}],"url":"https:\/\/backstory.london\/collections\/author-juan-pablo-villalobos.oembed","provider":"Backstory","version":"1.0","type":"link"}