Cross-Stitch — Jazmina Barrera

In Cross-Stitch, the debut novel from essayist and writer Jazmina Barrera, the unexpected death of a freind launches this novel-tapestry, where various time periodsm stories, conversations and trips are interwoven.

This is a story about growth, about the imbalances of identity and the adolescent body. Cross-Stitch narrates the path towards adulthood in a society pierced with sexist, classist, racist and environmental violence. Friendship and embroidery, that activity where women from hundreds of different cuktures and time periods have found oppression, repression, freedom, community and art.

Christina MacSweeney's nuanced and beautiful translation guides us on this travle chronicle— or a chronicle about the effect that trips have on individual and collective identity, and about friendship as we travel— with all of its linguistic, emotive, sentimental and cultural problems and discoveries.