Winner of the Dzanc Prize
for Fiction
Urabá, Colombia, 1990: A violent strike at plantations
across the banana zone leads to crops in flames, managers murdered, and the local
economy teetering on the brink. In retaliation, the banana producers finance
right-wing paramilitaries to cleanse the zone of guerrillas and their supposed
collaborators.
Through the intertwined lives of four
characters—a banana worker making a play for power in the guerrillas, a
decadent Colombian banana planter who runs his business from the safety of
Medellín, a widow in Urabá struggling to stay on the right side of the local
paramilitaries, and an American banana executive wading ever deeper into
troubled waters—The Banana Wars charts
the struggle to survive in impossible conditions, in a place where no one is to
be trusted and one false move can lead to death.
Starkly drawn from the true history of Urabá and
this period of conflict, including the unseen role of US corporate interests,
celebrated author Alan Grostephan’s latest is an incandescent historical novel
for fans of Jesmyn Ward, Roberto Bolaño, and Fernanda Melchor.
Genre: Historical
for Fiction
Urabá, Colombia, 1990: A violent strike at plantations
across the banana zone leads to crops in flames, managers murdered, and the local
economy teetering on the brink. In retaliation, the banana producers finance
right-wing paramilitaries to cleanse the zone of guerrillas and their supposed
collaborators.
Through the intertwined lives of four
characters—a banana worker making a play for power in the guerrillas, a
decadent Colombian banana planter who runs his business from the safety of
Medellín, a widow in Urabá struggling to stay on the right side of the local
paramilitaries, and an American banana executive wading ever deeper into
troubled waters—The Banana Wars charts
the struggle to survive in impossible conditions, in a place where no one is to
be trusted and one false move can lead to death.
Starkly drawn from the true history of Urabá and
this period of conflict, including the unseen role of US corporate interests,
celebrated author Alan Grostephan’s latest is an incandescent historical novel
for fans of Jesmyn Ward, Roberto Bolaño, and Fernanda Melchor.
Genre: Historical
Praise for this book
"A searing account of the ongoing consequences of colonial power structures in Colombia. What strikes me about The Banana Wars is the keen, journalistic eye and the refusal to look away from the lives and power struggles of everyday people - guerillas, paramilitary soldiers, sex workers, plantation owners and their backers overseas - all of whom are trapped in a brutal system of exploitation and madness." - Blair Austin
"In Uraba, Columbia, the banana trade is an extremely violent and unsettling history, one that Grostephan resists sugarcoating. Unlike an actual banana, there is nothing banal or mild about The Banana Wars. Told from several compelling perspectives, this novel is blistering, unflinching, and hard to put down." - Jen Beagin
"I dare you to enjoy a banana split after you've read Alan Grostephan's gut-wrenching novel The Banana Wars. Vividly written, unforgettably peopled, ranging across a landscape at once horrific and sublime, The Banana Wars will wring you out, leaving you at once exhausted and enriched, the way every good book exacts something from you even as it feeds your soul." - Angel Khoury
"Here is a novel in which dead men still speak 'for not even the dead shut their mouths.' The Banana Wars is as fine a novel as Juan Rulfo's Pedro Paramo or Fernanda Melchor's Hurricane Season. Alan Grostephan's prose is devastatingly precise, with a beauty that arises - perversely - only from horrifying situations. I have not read anything as fine as The Banana Wars in ages." - Michelle Latiolais
"Alan Grostephan writes with lush exuberance as though he were a Garcia Marquez's nephew. Confidently the narrative follows several people, switching POVs along the way, so we have a nearly omniscient picture of the class warfare, crime, and the mystery centered around the magic fruit, and at the same time intimate and sensual details. Cinematic. Each sentence delights." - Josip Novakovich
"Don't let banana in this title alleviate war in any way for you. From its opening quote by A.S. Ramos to its final chapter, Alan Grostephan's THE BANANA WARS is a riveting and indispensable novel that hails life as monumental, and the only force of the Universe worth talking about - fuck all them Riders of the Apocalypse! It just so happens that life burns brightest when its opposing forces are present and Grostephan knows this well; he is marvelous at detail, an engrossing storyteller and a deep feeler to boot. What a book! It was both a surprise and a balm for this war-torn heart and mind to read it." - Ismet Prcic
"In Uraba, Columbia, the banana trade is an extremely violent and unsettling history, one that Grostephan resists sugarcoating. Unlike an actual banana, there is nothing banal or mild about The Banana Wars. Told from several compelling perspectives, this novel is blistering, unflinching, and hard to put down." - Jen Beagin
"I dare you to enjoy a banana split after you've read Alan Grostephan's gut-wrenching novel The Banana Wars. Vividly written, unforgettably peopled, ranging across a landscape at once horrific and sublime, The Banana Wars will wring you out, leaving you at once exhausted and enriched, the way every good book exacts something from you even as it feeds your soul." - Angel Khoury
"Here is a novel in which dead men still speak 'for not even the dead shut their mouths.' The Banana Wars is as fine a novel as Juan Rulfo's Pedro Paramo or Fernanda Melchor's Hurricane Season. Alan Grostephan's prose is devastatingly precise, with a beauty that arises - perversely - only from horrifying situations. I have not read anything as fine as The Banana Wars in ages." - Michelle Latiolais
"Alan Grostephan writes with lush exuberance as though he were a Garcia Marquez's nephew. Confidently the narrative follows several people, switching POVs along the way, so we have a nearly omniscient picture of the class warfare, crime, and the mystery centered around the magic fruit, and at the same time intimate and sensual details. Cinematic. Each sentence delights." - Josip Novakovich
"Don't let banana in this title alleviate war in any way for you. From its opening quote by A.S. Ramos to its final chapter, Alan Grostephan's THE BANANA WARS is a riveting and indispensable novel that hails life as monumental, and the only force of the Universe worth talking about - fuck all them Riders of the Apocalypse! It just so happens that life burns brightest when its opposing forces are present and Grostephan knows this well; he is marvelous at detail, an engrossing storyteller and a deep feeler to boot. What a book! It was both a surprise and a balm for this war-torn heart and mind to read it." - Ismet Prcic
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