My Favorite Scar - Nicolás Ferraro translated by Mallory Craig-Kuhn

 

Argentinian writer Nicolás Ferraro's My Favorite Scar is a stunner of a novel. Some readers will call it a coming-of-age novel, some will  characterize it as gritty crime-fiction, and others will see it as a work of literary fiction with vivid lead characters. Whichever you choose to call it, you are correct, because My Favorite Scar is all of that and more. 

"Dad taught me how to remove bullets and sew up cuts when I was twelve. He taught me how to shoot at thirteen, and how to hotwire a car a few months later."

As fifteen-year-old Ámbar Mondragón looks back on her childhood, that is what she remembers about her father, a man so caught up in a life of crime that he has to depend on his little girl to patch him up when things go wrong - and things often go wrong in Victor's world, so wrong, in fact, that Victor and Ámbar seem to spend half their lives hiding out in one rundown motel or another.

About her father, she says:

"Dad carries his scars like medals. His whole body tells his story better than he could himself. Victor Montdragón is a man who can be read in Braille better than he can be heard, but he can't be understood in any language."

But things have never been this bad.

This time Victor limps home with his dead partner in tow and a picture in his mind of the tattooed hitman responsible for killing his friend. Victor knows that he will be next unless he can find the shooter and his boss before they find him, so all he has time for is a quick patch-job from Ámbar before the two of them begin their bloody roadtrip across Argentina so that Victor can exact his revenge and reclaim what he believes is his.

Ámbar, as usual, is there to do everything her father asks of her - and more - but she is no longer Victor's little girl. Now that she's old enough to think for herself, she begins to question everything she  thought she knew about her father, the mother who abandoned her years earlier, and the secrets she is so certain her father is keeping from her. But will she live long enough to get answers? And what will she do when she's finally had enough of living her entire life in the shadows?

My Favorite Scar includes some unforgettable moments between Victor and Ámbar as Victor tries to explain himself to his daughter. Victor doesn't always tell her the truth, but sometimes truth manages to slip out. One of my favorite moments between the two is when Victor tries to explain how he could have possibly done some of the things that bother her most:

"Having a conscience is a luxury, Ámbareté. It's for rich people. They have a clear conscience because they pay other people to get their hands dirty for them, other people who can't afford to have a conscience. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that your stomach growls louder than your conscience."

 It's way early to be saying it, but I suspect that My Favorite Scar will turn out to be one of my favorite reads of 2024.

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(My Favorite Scar will be published on January 23, 2024. It is the second Nicolás Ferrar novel to be published in English. The first was 2022's Cruz.)