What a pleasant surprise to see a Brazilian author on the NYT's Summer Reading List

This book had me thinking.

First: hi.

How are you?

As I was saying, this book had me thinking for a long time. There really are books that stay stuck in your head after you finish reading them, you know. I'm talking about Jantar Secreto, by Raphael Montes — out in English as The Secret Dinner. At the time, the central theme stuck with me, and I'm not going to tell you what it is; some things need to reach the reader through the page, never through a spoiler.

What I can tell you is that the plot seems to start from an innocent situation: four broke young people in Rio improvise a restaurant out of their apartment. But the story gradually turns into something else. Something quite sinister.

The Secret Dinner wasn't my most recent read. I didn't even read it this year. The reason for this post is that The New York Times put the book on its summer reading list this year — the only Brazilian title in the selection. It comes out in the United States on August 18, from Celadon Books, translated by Zoë Perry.

Getting published in the United States is harder than it looks. Less than 3% of all books published there are translations from other languages. Three percent. Which means the entire rest of the world fits inside that tiny sliver of what the American reader will find in bookstores. Just between us: by and large, they aren't very interested in the rest of the world. So when a Brazilian book slips through the gap and lands on a Times list, something good must be happening.

This year, Ana Paula Maia was one of the six finalists for the International Booker Prize with On Earth As It Is Beneath (Assim na Terra como embaixo da Terra in the original), translated by Padma Viswanathan and published by Charco Press.

In 2024, Itamar Vieira Jr. was also a finalist, with Crooked Plow (Torto Arado).

Geovani Martins was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, one of the largest publishing houses in the United States.

Carla Madeira continues her successful run, now published in 20 countries.

And now, Raphael Montes on the Times list.

The Secret Dinner had me thinking, and I think it will have the American reader thinking too. Hopefully they'll think well, and think for a good long while — after all, the real world is what happens over here.

That's all for now. Take care,

Emanoel Ferreira.