Bandits seem ubiquitous in Latin American culture. Even contemporary actors of violence are framed by narratives that harken back to old images of the rural bandit, either to legitimize or delegitimize violence, or to intervene in larger conflicts within or between nation-states. However, the bandit escapes a straightforward definition, since the same label can apply to the leader of thousands of soldiers (as in the case of Villa) or to the humble highwayman eking out a meager living by waylaying travelers at machete point. Dabove presents the reader not with a definition of the bandit, but with a series of case studies showing how the bandit trope was used in fictional and non-fictional narratives by writers and political leaders, from the Mexican Revolution to the present. By examining cases from Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela, from Pancho Villa's autobiography to Hugo Chavez's appropriation of his "outlaw" grandfather, Dabove reveals how bandits function as a symbol to expose the dilemmas or aspirations of cultural and political practices, including literature as a social practice and as an ethical experience.

El ano del desierto is the story of a year in the life of Maria Valdes Neylan, narrated by herself, from somewhere in Ireland or England. The novel narrates the (literal) dissolution of a city (Buenos Aires), of a nation (Argentina) and of a life story (that of Maria). The agent of this dissolution is the Wilderness (la intemperie). But, what is the Wilderness? The novel does not provide any definition or clarification regarding its nature. We do not know if it's a natural or supernatural phenomenon. We do not know if it's a sentient phenomenon, an instrument animated by an evil design or just an impersonal force. Furthermore, nobody witnesses the Wilderness in action. Only its effects are recorded: the gradual (but fast-paced) degradation and disappearance of buildings, streets, of all trace of human work or habitation, and its replacement by a nature (certainly not Mother Nature) out of control. Because of the Wilderness, the city disappears and the Desert reclaims what always belonged to it. This novel by Pedro Mairal (Buenos Aires, 1970) is a brilliant tour de force. On the one hand, it captures the Zeitgeist of post-2001, pre-Kirchner Argentina. But, as happens in Kafka's fictions (or in any work of literature worthy of that name) Mairal takes the allegory well beyond the mere document of the present. In these pages the reader will find a story that is simultaneously familiar and infinitely strange, the sights and sounds of Buenos Aires' everyday life, but also the peculiar taste of a nightmare. The novel is also a sui generis archive of Argentina's historical, cultural and literary experience (its events and characters, as well as its founding tropes and obsessions are all there). Susan Hallstead and Juan Pablo Dabove have exhaustively annotated the novel to allow the reader access to the myriad allusions and meanings embedded in the novel. However, in spite of Mairal's totalizing ambition, El ano del desierto never ceases to be a highly legible novel, with a capacity to move us with the vicissitudes of Maria's individual destiny. The introduction (also by Hallstead and Dabove) locates Mairal in his historical and literary context, and gives numerous clues for a complete understanding (and enjoyment) of this novel, one of the best in recent Argentine narrative.