Planes Flying Over a Monster: Essays

In ten intimate essays, Daniel Salda a Par s explores the cities he has lived in, each one home to a new iteration of himself. In Mexico City he's a young poet eager to prove himself. In Montreal--an opioid addict desperate for relief. In Madrid--a lonely student seeking pleasure in grotesque extremes. These now diverging, now coalescing selves raise questions: Where can we find authenticity? How do we construct the stories that define us? What if our formative memories are closer to fiction than truth?

Salda a Par s turns to literature and film, poetry and philosophy for answers. The result is a hybrid of memoir and criticism, "a sensory work, full of soundscapes, filth, planes, closed spaces, open vastness" (El Pa s).