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Death, Desire, and Other Destinations
DEATH, DESIRE, AND OTHER DESTINATIONS, Tara Isabel Zambrano’s debut short story collection, explores the rocky terrain of relationships and their fault lines, and unearths the boundaries between love, longing, and loss. Both real and surreal, lyrical and magical, sci-fi and speculative, these small stories shine a light in the darkness of seeking a human connection across space and time.
200 pages, Paperback
First published September 15, 2020
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September 3, 2020
Death, Desire, and other Destinations is an eclectic collection of flash fiction and short stories both abstract and intimately familiar. A striking combination of elemental needs and nurture clashing with the sometimes incomprehensible tragedies in life, like longing and loss.
In "Milk," a mother's love symbolizes our need and staying attachment to her for we have no teeth to master life while she innately nurtures to a fault: "We latch on to our mother's breasts even after we're grownups. Her nipples look like worn hooks attached to a swollen wall. There isn't much inside, but we like the closeness, and the clicking sound, her topless body attached to our hungry mouths. Her breasts blossom in summer, her body bounces like a stuffed toy. In winter she is vacuous and frumpy."
"Scooped-Out Chest," is the story of a heart that has had enough and leaves behind its owner, but not without first making clear the loss to follow: "When I slice a knife down my chest, my heart crawls out. It looks healthy and full. Cherry red inside out. I watch it drag itself on the floor, onto my desk overlooking the yard and the rees. Blood drips from its sides. Outside the moon floats on the cloudy horizon, fuzzy on the perimeter."
One of the most beautiful stories to me was "We're waiting to Hear Our Names". A young couple in a Chevy kissing on the back seat, "locked in each other's mouths like lightning and thunder" proceeds to tell in turn of each paragraph their entire life together and how it moves through the stages from honeymoon, having children, life after children and death: "We're lying in our graves separated by five years. The dirt is full of answers. Sometimes, we're whispering each other's name, and the dry flowers above us stir. And we're dreaming and waiting. We're waiting to hear our names."
The collection of these 50 stories is a striking melting pot of cultures, life's moments, and their mechanics. From my research of the author, I understand that Tara Isabel Zambrano is of Indian descent, an engineer, and has volunteered for Hospice. What I find unmistakable about this combination of attributes is that they reflect in the stories themselves. There are cultural aspects found that are innate to the Indian culture, while there are in contrast moments of pure Americana. Ultimately, it is hovering between a universal message about life's desires and anguishes.
What was surprising to me in many of the passages was the stripped versions of raw desire. They were reflected openly and often in many of the stories. A lot of lust and taboos within the pages, yet fundamentally true and borderless. There were stories of affairs, LGBTQ, relationships and dwarfism, deep desires of unrequited love, and lots of loving amongst.
Another focal point in many of the stories was parenthood and the desire to have children. In "Piecing," the unrequited desire to become pregnant reads: “I dream my baby is born in pieces, head, torso, limbs—all separate. I stitch him with a black thread so I can see the seams…Once while changing him, I accidentally pull the string, and he comes undone.” Each month she does not conceive feels like another death: “Cells building up on top of each other—a circus tent, taut, blistering. A few weeks later it collapses as if the stakes are pulled from the ground.”
Stories like these were the most visceral to me. Most of us are familiar with the emotions evoked in Death, Desire, and other Destinations but it is the deliverance and application that invites us to ponder the deeper meaning and speculate about the narrator's choices.
With that said, if you enjoy venturing to the depths of human emotions and desires while encountering the obscure and abstract along the way, this collection might be for you!
Happy Reading!
I received a copy of this novel from the publisher in exchange for a voluntary review. All opinion are my own. Thank you.
More of my reviews here:
Through Novel Time & Distance
In "Milk," a mother's love symbolizes our need and staying attachment to her for we have no teeth to master life while she innately nurtures to a fault: "We latch on to our mother's breasts even after we're grownups. Her nipples look like worn hooks attached to a swollen wall. There isn't much inside, but we like the closeness, and the clicking sound, her topless body attached to our hungry mouths. Her breasts blossom in summer, her body bounces like a stuffed toy. In winter she is vacuous and frumpy."
"Scooped-Out Chest," is the story of a heart that has had enough and leaves behind its owner, but not without first making clear the loss to follow: "When I slice a knife down my chest, my heart crawls out. It looks healthy and full. Cherry red inside out. I watch it drag itself on the floor, onto my desk overlooking the yard and the rees. Blood drips from its sides. Outside the moon floats on the cloudy horizon, fuzzy on the perimeter."
One of the most beautiful stories to me was "We're waiting to Hear Our Names". A young couple in a Chevy kissing on the back seat, "locked in each other's mouths like lightning and thunder" proceeds to tell in turn of each paragraph their entire life together and how it moves through the stages from honeymoon, having children, life after children and death: "We're lying in our graves separated by five years. The dirt is full of answers. Sometimes, we're whispering each other's name, and the dry flowers above us stir. And we're dreaming and waiting. We're waiting to hear our names."
The collection of these 50 stories is a striking melting pot of cultures, life's moments, and their mechanics. From my research of the author, I understand that Tara Isabel Zambrano is of Indian descent, an engineer, and has volunteered for Hospice. What I find unmistakable about this combination of attributes is that they reflect in the stories themselves. There are cultural aspects found that are innate to the Indian culture, while there are in contrast moments of pure Americana. Ultimately, it is hovering between a universal message about life's desires and anguishes.
What was surprising to me in many of the passages was the stripped versions of raw desire. They were reflected openly and often in many of the stories. A lot of lust and taboos within the pages, yet fundamentally true and borderless. There were stories of affairs, LGBTQ, relationships and dwarfism, deep desires of unrequited love, and lots of loving amongst.
Another focal point in many of the stories was parenthood and the desire to have children. In "Piecing," the unrequited desire to become pregnant reads: “I dream my baby is born in pieces, head, torso, limbs—all separate. I stitch him with a black thread so I can see the seams…Once while changing him, I accidentally pull the string, and he comes undone.” Each month she does not conceive feels like another death: “Cells building up on top of each other—a circus tent, taut, blistering. A few weeks later it collapses as if the stakes are pulled from the ground.”
Stories like these were the most visceral to me. Most of us are familiar with the emotions evoked in Death, Desire, and other Destinations but it is the deliverance and application that invites us to ponder the deeper meaning and speculate about the narrator's choices.
With that said, if you enjoy venturing to the depths of human emotions and desires while encountering the obscure and abstract along the way, this collection might be for you!
Happy Reading!
I received a copy of this novel from the publisher in exchange for a voluntary review. All opinion are my own. Thank you.
More of my reviews here:
Through Novel Time & Distance
Read
June 19, 2020I am the publicist for this luscious, absolutely gorgeous debut collection! Hit me up if you are interested in reviewing the book or interviewing the author.
February 10, 2022
Some interesting stories in here, and lots of beautiful language throughout.
3.5/5
3.5/5
September 29, 2020
Zambrano is a phenomenal storyteller. I was hooked by the first story alone as her writing is provocative and thought provoking. So many times I would sit there after finishing one like "wow what did I just read?" The desire theme was very strong in this collection and the sexual element of many of the stories really brought them to another level and made me think deeper about what Zambrano was trying to say. The death theme came in many forms such as parent loss, a miscarriage, and death of dreams. My favorite story is probably "Poison Damsels in Rajaji’s Harem, 1673" because of the way Zambrano effortlessly conveyed the feelings of loneliness and want in the characters. Overall, I am stunned and amazed by what I read, and I'm so glad I had the opportunity to read this collection.
*Thank you to the publisher for sending me an ARC. All opinions are my own*
*Thank you to the publisher for sending me an ARC. All opinions are my own*
November 9, 2020
An assured debut collection of flash fiction. My interview with the author will appear in the spring issue of Newfound Journal, coming in March 2021.
September 16, 2020
This slim set of flash fiction (short short stories ranging from 2-9 pages, in this case) manages to check both boxes I look for in short story collections- it is packed with bizarre details that effectively further a point about the human experience, and each of the stories stand alone well, though the style and themes are consistent throughout the book, linking them all loosely together. Thus, it was easy to put the book down at any point my schedule required, and feel quickly re-immersed upon returning.
The stories here tend toward the sapphic, though there are a fair amount of hetero exceptions. Zambrano doesn't shy away from sexual descriptions in the relationships that unfold across these pages, which I liked in principle but occasionally found overbearing in practice. The characters are diverse or unspecified, which gives the set a very inclusive and limitless aura. As the title indicates, most of the stories focus on death or desire in some form; there are many losses and longings in these pages, endings and false starts. Many also include some sort of otherworldly element, infusing the work with a hallucinatory quality. For example: A widow believes her husband, upon death, has become one with their house. A poisonous courtesan who can kill with a kiss but not feel love becomes entangled with a girl even more deadly than she. A woman who goes for a bikini wax would rather forget about her husband and enjoy the touch of the esthetician. One girl removes the heart from her chest in order to get to know it properly.
What I liked most about these stories is that each one digs into a particular emotion that is easy to comprehend and relate to, never mind the fact that the characters include aliens, snakes, ghosts, and more. Zambrano writes evocatively about the nuances of the human heart, with an exciting otherworldly slant to it all. Her writing is full of unusual imagery, especially involving the body and weather/atmosphere, and her metaphors are always thought-provoking even if sometimes challenging to decipher. Though some descriptions contain impossibilities, they paint clear and intriguing ideas, each one a rabbit hole thought experiment the reader can't resist falling into:
"The shining dust from the rubble streams in and mixes with your breath. Like a fish swimming to the surface for oxygen, you open your mouth wide, eat the day slowly."
All of these stories are separate and complete in themselves, though none of them seem mutually exclusive, and small details (like a particular animal or object or personality) popping up casually later on gives the whole collection a beautiful sort of flow. I'd call these stories speculative overall, though there's a timelessness to them that makes appearances of modern devices (like iPhones) and futuristic scenarios (like weddings on the moon being commonplace) feel shocking in the reminder that these narratives are grounded in real possibilities- in essence, if not in details.
I think there will be a particular sort of reader best suited to this collection; so much of it is melancholy and possibly triggering (CW: miscarriage, death of a loved one, cheating, mild body horror), the writing is gorgeous but oblique, and the reader needs a certain willingness to accept things that don't make literal sense. It's dreamy and wondrous, but also relentlessly strange. I know this won't be to every reader's taste, but for the right reader I think there's a lot to love in this collection and in Zambrano's style.
"Abandoned, I hold on to the shape her body has left behind in me, part home, part grave."
So much about this collection was just perfectly tailored to my short story tastes, and I had a delightfully sad and angsty time reading it. Though there are too many stories for me to say I'll remember them all individually, I can already tell that the broader topics and emotions will stick with me for a long time.
I received an eARC; it's possible that quotes and details could be different in the final version of this book.
The stories here tend toward the sapphic, though there are a fair amount of hetero exceptions. Zambrano doesn't shy away from sexual descriptions in the relationships that unfold across these pages, which I liked in principle but occasionally found overbearing in practice. The characters are diverse or unspecified, which gives the set a very inclusive and limitless aura. As the title indicates, most of the stories focus on death or desire in some form; there are many losses and longings in these pages, endings and false starts. Many also include some sort of otherworldly element, infusing the work with a hallucinatory quality. For example: A widow believes her husband, upon death, has become one with their house. A poisonous courtesan who can kill with a kiss but not feel love becomes entangled with a girl even more deadly than she. A woman who goes for a bikini wax would rather forget about her husband and enjoy the touch of the esthetician. One girl removes the heart from her chest in order to get to know it properly.
What I liked most about these stories is that each one digs into a particular emotion that is easy to comprehend and relate to, never mind the fact that the characters include aliens, snakes, ghosts, and more. Zambrano writes evocatively about the nuances of the human heart, with an exciting otherworldly slant to it all. Her writing is full of unusual imagery, especially involving the body and weather/atmosphere, and her metaphors are always thought-provoking even if sometimes challenging to decipher. Though some descriptions contain impossibilities, they paint clear and intriguing ideas, each one a rabbit hole thought experiment the reader can't resist falling into:
"The shining dust from the rubble streams in and mixes with your breath. Like a fish swimming to the surface for oxygen, you open your mouth wide, eat the day slowly."
All of these stories are separate and complete in themselves, though none of them seem mutually exclusive, and small details (like a particular animal or object or personality) popping up casually later on gives the whole collection a beautiful sort of flow. I'd call these stories speculative overall, though there's a timelessness to them that makes appearances of modern devices (like iPhones) and futuristic scenarios (like weddings on the moon being commonplace) feel shocking in the reminder that these narratives are grounded in real possibilities- in essence, if not in details.
I think there will be a particular sort of reader best suited to this collection; so much of it is melancholy and possibly triggering (CW: miscarriage, death of a loved one, cheating, mild body horror), the writing is gorgeous but oblique, and the reader needs a certain willingness to accept things that don't make literal sense. It's dreamy and wondrous, but also relentlessly strange. I know this won't be to every reader's taste, but for the right reader I think there's a lot to love in this collection and in Zambrano's style.
"Abandoned, I hold on to the shape her body has left behind in me, part home, part grave."
So much about this collection was just perfectly tailored to my short story tastes, and I had a delightfully sad and angsty time reading it. Though there are too many stories for me to say I'll remember them all individually, I can already tell that the broader topics and emotions will stick with me for a long time.
I received an eARC; it's possible that quotes and details could be different in the final version of this book.
November 11, 2020
Tara explores many avatars of a woman—a daughter, a mother, a wife, a lover, an executive, an astronaut—with such detail and extraordinary finesse that you feel you know all of them, their places in their lives, in their societies. You ache with their pain, sigh with their desire, weep for their loss.
Most striking to me is how Tara lays out in the open the desire of a woman without draping it in layers of acceptance as is done in many cultures, especially South Asian. Desire is real, Tara tells us, be it in the alleys of a Mumbai slum or on the surface of the moon.
My favorites are many but if I have to pick a few, here are some story titles with lines that make the stories shine and the characters real:
Only Buildings – “Sex is like cotton candy: the more you have, the more you want, he says.”
Mumtaz in Burhanpur - “The girl has a tattoo of rose-water fountain behind her neck. The boy licks inked skin, his tongue drawing a map of river Tapti on whose banks the mausoleum was supposed to be.”
Ghosht Korma - “I stand topless by the window. And I realize it’s going to be another long day with no food. The Housekeeper always says, Earn your meals. My body gleams, my stomach hurts.”
Spaceman – “I don’t tell him that you and I slept in separate beds. I don’t tell him that I cared for you like a mother takes care of her child. Hours ache by as I dream about being lost in darkness, my body spinning in space, naked.”
I wish there were more writers like Tara to bring out the camouflaged truths in relationships, the lines hiding beneath smiles, the tremors under the surface.
Most striking to me is how Tara lays out in the open the desire of a woman without draping it in layers of acceptance as is done in many cultures, especially South Asian. Desire is real, Tara tells us, be it in the alleys of a Mumbai slum or on the surface of the moon.
My favorites are many but if I have to pick a few, here are some story titles with lines that make the stories shine and the characters real:
Only Buildings – “Sex is like cotton candy: the more you have, the more you want, he says.”
Mumtaz in Burhanpur - “The girl has a tattoo of rose-water fountain behind her neck. The boy licks inked skin, his tongue drawing a map of river Tapti on whose banks the mausoleum was supposed to be.”
Ghosht Korma - “I stand topless by the window. And I realize it’s going to be another long day with no food. The Housekeeper always says, Earn your meals. My body gleams, my stomach hurts.”
Spaceman – “I don’t tell him that you and I slept in separate beds. I don’t tell him that I cared for you like a mother takes care of her child. Hours ache by as I dream about being lost in darkness, my body spinning in space, naked.”
I wish there were more writers like Tara to bring out the camouflaged truths in relationships, the lines hiding beneath smiles, the tremors under the surface.
October 23, 2020
This is a solidly satisfying book of (mostly) flash. Zambrano has a couple cardinal points that she navigates between-- there are lots of stories here about being Indian, or Indian American, set in the states and in South Asia. There are lots of stories about sex-- sometimes exploring lust in pretty explicit terms, and sometimes in the context of exploring and rejecting gender roles, sometimes related to parental expectations. But though the story contains a lot of stories, Zambrano's handling of these broad concepts doesn't get boring or repetitive. Instead, her stories find new ways to have these ideas intersect with the mental life of new people, mostly women. The stories themselves move in somewhat elliptical ways-- though they usually take only three pages, the stories often end up in places radically different than where they started. But in spite of that drift and ranginess, there's a fun interconnectedness to the stories, one to the other, as a closing or dominant image from one story will rhyme in the next story, like a line of elephants held together, trunk to tail.
I liked these stories a lot, even though few of them, on their own, blew me away. The stories don't fall into traditional shapes-- rising action, or the jump scare or the resonant final image-- but they also didn't feel formless.
I liked these stories a lot, even though few of them, on their own, blew me away. The stories don't fall into traditional shapes-- rising action, or the jump scare or the resonant final image-- but they also didn't feel formless.
October 30, 2020
Prepare yourself--by letting go of all expectations of what’s to come--to enter a world of the wildly exotic, strange and beautiful that, like our deepest, most vivid dreams, is also a world of the completely real. Replete with characters of the most other-worldly existences and desires, they also walk on the solid ground of personal, cultural destiny that engages the reader with their universal familiarity. As they journey, you journey alongside them. As they love, die and are reborn, you do the same, in story after story of perfect, delectable length.
November 3, 2020
This collection was my “getaway” drug for the week prior to election. Again and again, Zambrano’s stories reminded me of Lydia Davis, Joy Williams, Diane Williams. Her prose is precise and polished, her characters mesmerizing. Scooped-Out Chest and Spaceman left me nodding my head and feeling tingly, while Ghosht Korma sent shivers down the spine and brought to mind scenes from Anthony’s Marra’s story Chechnya. Zambrano conjures up images that can truly be called out of this world. For anyone looking to forget about the headlines for a few days, I recommend this wonderful book.
February 4, 2021
An utterly beautiful story collection about the spaces between longing and death. The subjects range from the real and social, as observed on Planet Earth, to the fantastic and cosmic. The prose is erotically driven, kaleidoscopic, offering a montage of the sensuous and surreal that culminates in something like rapture—pure poetry. Reading this book is like swimming inside a rainbow, clutching color for it only to change in your hand. Zambrano has captured the magic and tragedy of life.
January 30, 2021
Slim volume of beautiful stories. I loved the short stories I've come across by Zambrano in literary journals and reading a full book of her creations was a treat. She writes so astutely of desire. Pure gorgeousness.
September 14, 2020
This beautiful and stylish short fiction collection carries the reader to many places, some familiar, some exotic, but the most satisfying is the world Zambrano makes of the female psyche.
September 16, 2020
Stunning, captivating, delicious. I highly recommend this book.
September 17, 2020
Full Review at World Literature Today:
https://www.worldliteraturetoday.org/...
https://www.worldliteraturetoday.org/...
Want to read
November 30, 2020Obsessed with this cover and pushing for my library to purchase :o
Currently reading
January 3, 2021I heard Tara read on the Les Salon Bleues author readings with Paige McGreevey. Based on her performance I ordered the book right away. So far I have not been disappointed.
November 19, 2020
It’s wild to remember, while reading this, that this is Zambrano’s debut short story collection. In many ways, she’s already cemented herself as one of the all-time greats of flash fiction, so to read her work collected like this is a revelatory experience. These stories are mesmerizing in their lyricism, in their frank ways of facing sexuality, identity, love, lust, and loss. I’ve been reading flash for a long time, but rarely is a writer able to keep me guessing quite like Zambrano was able to do here. I wanted to read this one quickly, because the stories were just that good, but I’m glad I opted instead to sip this slowly. This is the kind of book where you want to let the prose seep into your subconscious and allow you to experience the craft at work. Debut flash collections don’t get much better than this, and I’m very excited to see what Zambrano comes out with next.
June 15, 2021
Electric. My skin buzzes from each story. I can’t wait to read Tara’s next collection!
July 14, 2021
Review of "Death, Desire and Other Destinations"
This book has its own unique voice which has its very own soul which carries magic. I chose to give it a five star review because I'm still utterly rapt even after i long finished reading. I'm still living in the moments of each story, each detail, soaking in the lyrical quality of its story telling. The collection tugs on themes I relate to considering my culture. Themes of abandonment, wonder, travel, fear, loneliness, magic in ways both hilarious at times and sad. Stories are tender and speak of tender but courageous character who has it in them to feel---or not. I recommend this book to wants to live in the delicious suspended disbelief I experienced. There are stories that i want to revisit, relive and relish all over again. My most favs are Alligator, Lunar Marriage, Scooped out Chest, Cubes, New Old, We're waiting to hear our names.
This book has its own unique voice which has its very own soul which carries magic. I chose to give it a five star review because I'm still utterly rapt even after i long finished reading. I'm still living in the moments of each story, each detail, soaking in the lyrical quality of its story telling. The collection tugs on themes I relate to considering my culture. Themes of abandonment, wonder, travel, fear, loneliness, magic in ways both hilarious at times and sad. Stories are tender and speak of tender but courageous character who has it in them to feel---or not. I recommend this book to wants to live in the delicious suspended disbelief I experienced. There are stories that i want to revisit, relive and relish all over again. My most favs are Alligator, Lunar Marriage, Scooped out Chest, Cubes, New Old, We're waiting to hear our names.
May 15, 2022
“My lover is big, as dense as a neutron star, his eyes two cosmic lenses. When he licks my collar bone, his words roll off his tongue and settle around my neck like a choker.”
Tara Isabel Zambrano’s writing is evocative, sensual, corporeal, and unsettling. Often referencing her Indian heritage, her flash fictions are fabulist and otherworldly, sometimes downright surreal, always deeply human. A stunner of a fiction collection.
Tara Isabel Zambrano’s writing is evocative, sensual, corporeal, and unsettling. Often referencing her Indian heritage, her flash fictions are fabulist and otherworldly, sometimes downright surreal, always deeply human. A stunner of a fiction collection.
June 29, 2023
A few stories I really loved. Some of them I thought could really benefit from some extra length. Some really good lines throughout
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