Gesell Dome

Writing in the tradition of William Faulkner and John Dos Passos, Saccomanno, winner of the 2013 Dashiell Hammett Prize for noir fiction, exposes the secret life of a seaside resort town south of Buenos Aires, after the tourists have left. The one-way mirror in a Gesell dome that lets researchers watch people acting unawares is the metaphor here for readers observing the vagaries of the locals during the off-season. That this behavior is so savage reflects not only the town's Nazi past but also the less-than-civilized recent history of Argentina itself. A motley crew of loan sharks, skinheads, blackmailers and phantoms informs this novel, and the omniscient narrator alternates with first-person testimonies and articles from the town's weekly newspaper. Dante is its editor and sole reporter, who with his passion for the garbage of other people's lives depends on a limo driver and a unisex stylist for the sordid details that he prints.