Roberto Bolano - Collected Works (25 books)

* Roberto Bolano - Collected Works (25 books)

ROBERTO BOLAÑO ÁVALOS (1953–2003) was a Chilean novelist, short-story writer, poet and essayist who stands as one of the most influential and enigmatic writers of late twentieth-century Latin American literature. Rejecting literary nationalism and the conventions of the Latin American "Boom," he positioned himself as a literary outsider, fiercely critical of cultural institutions and deeply committed to literature as a form of moral and existential inquiry. His work is marked by obsession, irony, political trauma, and a persistent search for meaning amid chaos and violence.

Bolaño first gained wide recognition with THE SAVAGE DETECTIVES (1998), a novel that would become his breakthrough and a defining text of contemporary world literature. Structured as a fragmented oral history, the novel follows two young poets as they drift across Mexico, Europe, and beyond in pursuit of a lost literary figure and an uncompromising poetic ideal. The book captures the energy of youthful rebellion while also reflecting on failure, exile, and the long shadows cast by history.

His posthumously published masterpiece, 2666 (2004), cemented Bolaño’s global reputation. Vast in scope and ambition, the novel is divided into five interlinked parts that move between Europe, the United States, and Mexico, circling around the fictional city of Santa Teresa and a series of brutal femicides. 2666 blends literary criticism, crime fiction, historical reflection, and philosophical meditation, confronting the reader with the problem of representing extreme violence. It is widely regarded as Bolaño’s most complex and demanding work, as well as one of the major novels of the twenty-first century.

Alongside these monumental novels, Bolaño produced a rich body of shorter and more experimental works. Novels such as DISTANT STAR (1996), AMULET (1999), and BY NIGHT IN CHILE (2000) explore themes of political complicity, dictatorship, and the haunting persistence of memory in Latin America. His short-story collections, particularly LAST EVENINGS ON EARTH , showcase his range and precision, often focusing on writers, drifters, and failed revolutionaries caught between hope and disillusionment.

Although best known for his fiction, Bolaño always considered himself a poet first. In the 1970s, he co-founded the Infrarealist movement in Mexico City, a radical poetic collective that sought to disrupt literary complacency through provocation and refusal of institutional authority. His poetry, collected in volumes such as THE ROMANTIC DOGS (2000) and TRES (2000), is raw, autobiographical, and marked by themes of exile, youthful idealism, friendship, and loss. Across his oeuvre, Bolaño forged a singular literary voice—restless, darkly humorous, and unflinchingly honest—that continues to shape contemporary fiction worldwide.


The following books are in ePUB format:

== NOVELS ==

* 2666 [tr. Wimmer] (FSG, 2008)
* A Little Lumpen Novelita [tr. Wimmer] (New Directions, 2014 / Picador, 2025)
* Amulet [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2006 / Picador, 2025)
* Antwerp [tr. Wimmer] (Picador, 2024)
* By Night in Chile [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2003)
* Distant Star [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2004)
* Monsieur Pain [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2010 / Picador, 2025)
* Nazi Literature in the Americas [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2008)
* The Savage Detectives [tr. Wimmer] (FSG, 2007)
* The Skating Rink [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2009 / Picador, 2025)
* The Spirit of Science Fiction [tr. Wimmer] (Penguin, 2019)
* The Third Reich [tr. Wimmer] (FSG, 2011)
* Woes of the True Policeman [tr. Wimmer] (FSG, 2012)

== SHORT STORIES ==

* Collected Short Stories [tr. Andrews & Wimmer] (Vintage UK, 2024)
* Cowboy Graves: Three Novellas [tr. Wimmer] (Penguin, 2021)
* The Insufferable Gaucho [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2010 / Picador, 2025)
* Last Evenings on Earth [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2006)
* Posthumous Stories [tr. Andrews & Wimmer] (Picador, 2025)
* The Return [tr. Andrews] (New Directions, 2010 / Picador, 2024)
* The Secret of Evil [tr. Andrews & Wimmer] (New Directions, 2012)

== POETRY ==

* The Romantic Dogs: Poems, 1980-1998 [tr. Healy] (New Directions, 2008)
* Tres [tr. Healy, Bilingual Edition] (New Directions, 2011)
* The Unknown University [tr. Healy] (New Directions, 2013)

== ESSAYS ==

* Between Parentheses: Essays, Articles, and Speeches, 1998-2003 [tr. Wimmer] (New Directions, 2011)

== INTERVIEWS ==

* The Last Interview & Other Conversations [tr. Perez] (Melville House, 2009)


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