The President's Room

Ricardo Romero, Charlotte Coombe

• Publisher: Charco Press
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781999722722
• eBook ISBN: 9781999722739
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literature General
• Index: Literature

A taut, appealing, and often quite funny exploration of existential angst. — Kirkus Reviews

In a nameless suburb in an equally nameless country, every house has a room reserved for the president. No one knows when or why this came to be. It's simply how things are, and no one seems to question it except for one young boy.The room is kept clean and tidy, nobody talks about it and nobody is allowed to use it. It is for the president and no one else. But what if he doesn't come? And what if he does? As events unfold, the reader is kept in the dark about what's really going on. So much so, in fact, that we begin to wonder if even the narrator can be trusted...Ricardo Romero has been compared to Franz Kafka and Italo Calvino, and we see why in this eerie, meditative novel narrated by a shy young boy who seems to be very good at lying about the truth. Following in the footsteps of Julio Cortázar and a certain literary tradition of sinister rooms (such as Dr Jekyll's laboratory), The President's Room is a mysterious tale based on the suspicion that a house is never just one single home.

Copyright

First published by Charco Press 2017

Charco Press Ltd., Office 59, 44-46 Morningside Road, Edinburgh EH10 4BF

Copyright © Ricardo Romero 2015 (by agreement with Irène Barki)

English translation copyright © Charlotte Coombe 2017

This book was originally published in Spanish under the title La habitación del presidente in 2015 by Eterna Cadencia (Argentina).

The rights of Ricardo Romero to be identified as the author of this work and of Charlotte Coombe to be identified as the translator of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. This book is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publisher, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by the applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN: 978 1 9997227 2 2
e-book: 978 1 9997227 3 9

www.charcopress.com

Edited by Annie McDermott
Cover design by Pablo Font
Typeset by Laura Jones

Table of contents

• The President’s Room
• Copyright