'No Place to Bury the Dead', 'The Hunter' ask what lengths you'll go for others

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4.2 • 672 Ratings

🗓️ 10 January 2025

⏱️ 13 minutes

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Summary

Two novels explore the way that violence and loss can ripple across a village, town – or even entire countries. First, in Karina Sainz Borgo's No Place to Bury the Dead, a plague that causes amnesia runs rampant across an unnamed Latin American country. One mother's flight brings her to a border-town cemetery that operates on disputed land. In today's episode, Borgo joins NPR's Elissa Nadworny for a conversation that touches on the importance of death rituals, the myth of Antigone, and a real-life cemetery that exists along the border between Venezuela and Colombia. Then, Tana French has described her novels The Searcher and its sequel, The Hunter, as her take on the American Western. The novels follow Cal Hooper, a retired Chicago police officer who moves to rural Ireland. In The Hunter, the life Cal has built in Ardnakelty is complicated by an unexpected arrival. In today's episode, French speaks with Here & Now's Chris Bentley about her interest in writing from an outsider's perspective, the tension between blood and chosen family, and the particular experience of life in a small town.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey, it's Empire's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbaugh. Violence and loss have a way of
0:08.0	rippling out through a town, city, or even a country. In a bit, we'll hear from best-selling
0:12.8	author Tana French about her book, The Hunter, and how she translates the very American idea of
0:18.4	the Western into small-town Ireland. But first, the novel,
0:22.6	No Place to Bury the Dead is set, well, somewhere unnamed. That's because the crux of the novel
0:27.8	is about borders and contested land and whether or not the rituals over death supersede the lines
0:33.9	we draw. Author Karina Sines Borgo spoke with Empires Ellis and Nadwarnie about how
0:38.2	this book was actually based on real-life events. That's ahead. In the U.S., national security
0:45.0	news can feel far away from daily life. Distant wars, murky conflicts, diplomacy behind
0:51.0	closed doors on our new show, Sources and Methods. NPR reporters on the ground
0:55.6	bring you stories of real people helping you understand why distant events matter here at home.
1:01.7	Listen to sources and methods on the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts.
1:07.2	In the new novel, No Place to Burry the Dead, a plague that causes amnesia is rampant
1:12.3	in an unnamed Latin American country where a young mother, a hairdresser, named Angustias, lives.
1:18.4	After the birth of twins, she uproots her family and travels to a border area, seeking a safer
1:23.4	life for them. When the twins die, she goes on a journey to bury them. She seeks the help of a
1:29.4	larger-than-life woman, Visitacion, who runs a cemetery on contested land and finds a refuge of sorts.
1:37.2	No Place to bury the Dead is translated by Elizabeth Breyer and written by Venezuelan journalist
1:41.9	Karina Sines Borgo, who joins us now. Welcome to the program.
1:46.1	Thank you. Thank you so much for invitation and the opportunity to talk about this novel.
1:50.8	So tell us about this woman who runs the cemetery and why authorities consider her an outlaw.
1:57.1	Well, in a way I try to, this novel is based on true facts.
	...

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