ANDRÉS BARBA first became known in 2001 when his novel La hermana de Katia, shortlisted for the Herralde Prize, was published to considerable public and critical acclaim. It was followed by Ahora tocad música de baile, Versiones de Teresa, winner of the Torrente Ballester award, and Agosto, octubre, Muerte de un caballo, for which he won the 2011 Juan March short novel award, Ha dejado de llover, and his latest work, En presencia de un payaso. His books have been translated into ten languages.LISA DILLMAN translates from Spanish and Catalan and teaches in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Emory University. Some of her recent translations include Signs Preceding the End of the World, by Yuri Herrera, which won the 2016 Best Translated Book Award; Such Small Hands and Rain Over Madrid, by Andrés Barba; Monastery, co-translated with Daniel Hahn, by Eduardo Halfon; and Salting the Wound, by Víctor del Árbol.

"Andrés Barba needs no advice. He has already created a world that is perfectly realized and has a craft that is inappropriate for a writer of his age."—Mario Vargas Llosa, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature"Barba is a master of the novella . . . A gorgeous, fully realized collection."—Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review)"The four novellas in Barba’s wonderful and intense new collection share a melancholy sensibility and a yearning, born of persistent loneliness."—Publishers Weekly"The destructive consequences of those obsessions, traced with an almost clinical precision, are the substance of Barba’s absorbing, unnerving stories."—Words Without Borders