A short life of the author
Guadalupe Nettel (b. 1973) was born in Mexico City. She studied literature at the UNAM and the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris. She is the editor of the Revista de la Universidad de México.
Life and Career
El cuerpo en que nací (The Body Where I Was Born, 2011) — an autobiographical novel narrated as a session with a psychoanalyst, about growing up with a birthmark on her eye — is her breakthrough work. It is a frank, witty, and unsentimental account of physical difference, childhood, and the experience of not fitting in.
Después del invierno (After the Winter, 2014) — a love story between a Mexican woman in Paris and a Cuban man in New York — won the Herralde Prize. Her story collections — El matrimonio de los peces rojos (Natural Histories, 2013) — explore the parallels between human and animal behaviour with dark precision.
Still Born (La hija única, 2020) — about two pregnant women, one who wants her baby and one who doesn’t — is her most discussed novel internationally.
Major Works and Themes
Nettel writes about the body, difference, desire, and the lives of people who don’t fit conventional categories. Her fiction is psychologically precise, darkly funny, and formally controlled.
Key Works
- The Body Where I Was Born (2011)
- Still Born (2020)
Collecting Nettel
Spanish originals (Anagrama) are the primary collected form. English translations (Seven Stories Press, Fitzcarraldo Editions) bring $10–$25.