The Mutations
What happens when someone loses their silver tongue?
Author: Comensal, Jorge; Charlotte Whittle (English translation)
Year first published: 2023
Original Language: Spanish (Translated to english)
Genre: Dark Comedy
Originally written in Spanish, The Mutations is a dark comedy about a Mexican lawyer, named Ramon, who suddenly develops a rapid and aggressive form of cancer that takes away the thing most important to not only his livelihood, but his very being: his Tongue. He was always good with words, but now suddenly becomes unable to speak due to removal of the tongue due to a large tumor. Before this he was a smooth talking charismatic man that maybe went a little too far with the machismo, but seemed to be a respected member of his community, aside from by his dirtbag scammer brother who agrees to lend him the amount needed for his surgery, which according to Ramon's thoughts, is mostly dirty money.
From there, the story branches out and takes a look at the lives of the people around him; his family, his maid, his therapist, and his oncologist.
The writing is engaging and witty, and I found myself laughing out loud at several parts of the story, but I felt like, while cohesive enough, the story itself was lacking something. It felt much like just a collection of anecdotes about all of these people without really going anywhere. The descriptions were vivid and honestly pretty funny.
I feel like the narrative suffered for trying to include too many threads to too many characters. It didn’t need to give that much backstory or plot to the two doctors, and Ernesto as a whole was an unneeded plot point. In fact it kinda felt almost a little insulting that Teresa, the therapist, was mostly reduced to her patients and her love of weed. It got to the point where it barely focused on Ramon, until eventually a year passes and he's at death's door. We don't really get much of a look into Ramon or his feelings as his body began to deteriorate.
Aside from the humorous dialogue and the strangely in depth recipe for marijuana cookies, there wasn't really a whole lot that stood out about this book for me. Even just a couple of weeks after reading it, I've already forgotten most of what was going on. It wasn't a very long novel, and not a super difficult read. I have mixed feelings about it, but enjoyed it enough.
Honestly the cursing parrot was probably the best part.
Review posted 2024/02/22