Voyager: Constellations of Memory [Paperback]

A startling book-length essay, at once grand and intimate, from National Book Award finalist Nona Fern?ndez.

Voyagerbegins with Nona Fern?ndez accompanying her elderly mother to the doctor to seek an explanation for her frequent falls and inability to remember what preceded them. As the author stares at the image of her mothers brain scan, it occurs to her that the electrical signals shown on the screen resemble the night sky.

Inspired by the mission of the Voyager spacecrafts, Fern?ndez begins a process of observation and documentation. She describes a recent trip to the remote Atacama desertone of the worlds best spots for astronomical observationto join people who, like her, hope to dispel the mythologized history of Chiles new democracy. Weaving together the story of her mothers illness with story of her country and of the cosmos itself, Fern?ndez braids astronomy and astrology, neuroscience and memory, family history and national history into this brief but intensely imagined autobiographical essay. Scrutinizing the mechanisms of personal, civic, and stellar memory, she insists on preserving the truth of what weve seen and experienced, and finding ways to recover what people and countries often prefer to forget.

InVoyager, Fern?ndez finds a new container for her profound and surreal reckonings with the past. One of the great chroniclers of our day, she has written a rich and resonant book.

Nona Fern?ndezwas born in Santiago, Chile. She is an actress and writer, and has published two plays, a collection of short stories, and six novels, includingSpace InvadersandThe Twilight Zone, which was a finalist for the National Book Award.

Natasha Wimmeris the translator of nine books by Roberto Bola?o, includingThe Savage Detectivesand2666. Her most recent translations are Nona Fern?ndezsThe Twilight ZoneandSudden Deathby ?lvaro Enrigue. She lives in lÃN