TE23 Double Feature

The President Shop (novel excerpt) Vesna Marić

Chapter 1

Rosa pushed Mona into the world on a December evening. And as the infant emerged from the soft, pink chamber of the womb at 7:13 pm, under the luminous neon line of light on the ceiling, it was his countenance that Mona saw first: the President, as rendered in a black and-white portrait in an ornately flowery gilded frame. It was as if the picture, or the picture frame, was the President’s cell, and his figure the cell’s silent nucleus, floating around the country’s interiors, watching all. The President was handsome, with high cheekbones that held his face taut like pegs pull a tent or wind yanks a flag. Mostly the pictures of him were black and white, from his 283

[Hear Vesna Marić talking about her novel, The President Shop, on the June 5, 2022 episode of Women in Translation on Trafika Europe Radio, right here .]

Vesna Marić