Violence and Victimhood in Hispanic Crime Fiction

At the heart of crime fiction is an investigation into an act of violence. Studies of the genre have generally centered on the relationship between the criminal and the investigator. Focusing on contemporary crime fiction from the Spanish-speaking world, this collection of new essays explores the role of the victim.
Contributors discuss how the definition of “victim,” the nature of the crime, the identification of the body and its treatment by authorities reflect shifting social landscapes, changing demographics, economic crises and political corruption and instability.

Shalisa Collins is an associate professor of Spanish at St. Norbert College in Wisconsin. She has published articles and chapters on Latin American crime fiction and writers of the neo-policial. She lives in Green Bay, Wisconsin.
Renée W. Craig-Odders is a professor of Spanish at the University of Wisconsin–Stevens Point. The author of several articles and books on Spanish detective fiction, she lives in Plover, Wisconsin.
Marcie Paul is a professor of Spanish and director of the honors program at St. Norbert College. She has published articles on Latin American detective fiction and on the influence of the genre on post-modernist narrative. She lives in De Pere, Wisconsin.

Edited by Shalisa M. Collins, Renée W. Craig-Odders and Marcella L. Paul
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 192
Bibliographic Info: notes, bibliographies, index
Copyright Date: 2018
pISBN: 978-0-7864-9908-3
eISBN: 978-1-4766-3201-8
Imprint: McFarland

Preface 1
Introduction (Shalisa M. Collins, Renée W. ­Craig-Odders, and Marcella L. Paul) 3
Spain
Expendable Commodities: Women and Children as Victims
of the Sex Trade in Contemporary Spanish Crime Fiction (Renée W. ­Craig-Odders) 11
Susana Hernández’s Crime Fiction and Resolution
Through Resistance (Nina L. Molinaro) 30
Dying Like a Man: Feminization and Castration in Two Novels
by Lorenzo Silva (Elena Iglesias-Villamel) 50
Violence as Representative of Societal Ethos
in Arturo Peréz-Reverte’s El francotirador paciente (Jeffrey Oxford) 69
Latin America
Who Is the Victim Here?: The City, the Corpse and Genre
in the Crime Novels of Ramón Díaz Eterovic (Shalisa M. Collins) 87
Crime and Punishment: From Victims to Avengers in Eduardo Sacheri’s La noche de la Usina (Carolina Miranda) 108
Bodies and Other Texts: Censoring the Victim in Martín Solares’s
Los minutos negros (Marcella L. Paul) 125
The Lost Daughters of Mexico: Crime and Impunity in David Toscana’s Los puentes de Königsberg (Judy Cervantes) 148
Reimagining the Novela Negra: The Victim’s Perspective
in “El chico sucio” (Gizella Meneses) 164
About the Contributors 181
Index 183