About the book

When sixteen-year-old Gabriel Lazris, an American in Santiago, Chile, meets Caro Ravest, something clicks. Caro, who is Chilean, is charming, curious, and deeply herself. Gabriel dreams of their future together. But everybody’s saying there’s going to be a coup—and no one says it louder than Gabriel’s dad, a Nixon-loving newspaper editor who Gabriel suspects is working with the C.I.A. Gabriel’s father is adamant that the moment political unrest erupts, their family is going home. To Gabriel, though, Chile is home.

Decades later, Gabriel’s American-raised adult daughter Nina heads to Buenos Aires in a last-ditch effort to save her dissertation. Quickly, though, she gets sidetracked: first by a sexy professor, then by a controversial book called Guerra Eterna. A document of war and an underground classic, Guerra Eterna transforms Nina’s sense of her family and identity, pushing her to confront the moral weight of being an American citizen in a hemisphere long dominated by U.S. power. But not until Short War’s coda do we get true insight into the divergent fortunes of Gabriel Lazris and Caro Ravest.

Shaped by the geopolitical forces that brought far-right dictators like Pinochet to power, their fates reverberate through generations, evoking thorny questions about power, privilege, and how to live with the guilt of the past.

Excerpts

Praise for Short War

“[Short War] opens in Santiago, Chile, with a lovely, eerie assuredness, a moment like an incantation…” - The New York Times

“Meyer finds an admirable balance between the significant historical context and the individual characters’ drama. This well-honed novel humanizes an enduring nightmare of failed democracy.” - Publishers Weekly

“A slow burn that absolutely ignites as the author deftly interweaves history, politics, and family.” - Kirkus

“Short War is a sharp exploration of the long afterlife and peripheral impact of historical trauma. Meyer vividly introduces characters whose lives are forever divided into a before and after; their lost connections create both a compelling psychological thread and a mystery that unfolds across generations, asking us to consider the personal and structural forces that have shaped us. This debut introduces an important and accomplished new literary voice.” – Danielle Evans, author of The Department of Historical Corrections 

“Lily Meyer has all the sensitivity to language and nuance that comes from being an experienced translator as well as a gifted writer, deftly alternating between lighthearted romance, life-or-death political intrigue, and literary mystery. A stellar roller-coaster of a debut.” – Megan McDowell, National Book Award winning translator of Samanta Schweblin's Seven Empty Houses

“Lily Meyer writes with transfixing concision. In this excellent, assured first novel, Meyer’s knowledge of Chile comes vividly to life. Short War is astute and absorbing, a complex novel about adolescence and the insidious role of the United States in the Pinochet dictatorship.” – Idra Novey, author of Take What You Need

“Lily Meyer's Short War is a breathtaking debut: a deeply felt portrait of youth and longing, and also a geopolitical barnburner of a story that spans continents and generations, exposing US foreign policy on the scale of an intimate human drama. Meyer's prose is beautifully understated, conjuring up a style on her own. Short War is the most assured debut I've read in a very long time. This is the announcement of a major new talent.” – Dwyer Murphy, author of The Stolen Coast

“Short War is extraordinary. Any debut novelist would be gratified and delighted to pull off a compelling love story or a propulsive mystery or a tangled multi-generational family drama or a devastating political and historical novel—but somehow Lily Meyer manages to do all of that here in this ambitious, suspenseful, and beautifully constructed book.” – Chris Bachelder, author of National Book Award finalist The Throwback Special

“This compelling mix of political thriller with bildungsroman cutting across generations and nations blazes a pathway for the contemporary novel. Short War is bittersweet and sexy, a melancholy fable of the trauma of fascism that is both an American story and a transnational grief. What a gift to have storytellers like Lily Meyer on the rise now.” – Gina Apostol, author of La Tercera