Sudden Death (Paperback) - Alvaro Enrigue

As Caravaggio, the libertine of Italy's art world, and the loutish Spanish poet Quevedo aim to settle scores over the course of one brutal tennis match, the old European order edges closer to eruption. Across the ocean, in early sixteenth-century Mexico, the Aztec Empire is under the fatal grip of Hernan Cortes and his Mayan lover.

'Glorious' New York Times

'Endlessly inventive', Guardian, Best Books of 2016

'Wildly funny' Lauren Groff, author of Fates and Furies

As Caravaggio, the libertine of Italy's art world, and the loutish Spanish poet Quevedo aim to settle scores over the course of one brutal tennis match, the old European order edges closer to eruption.

Across the ocean, in early sixteenth-century Mexico, the Aztec Empire is under the fatal grip of Hernan Cortes and his Mayan lover. While they scheme and conquer, fight and fuck, their domestic comedy will change the course of history, throwing the world - and Rome's tennis match - into a mind-bending reverie of assassinations, executions, papal dramas, carnal liaisons and artistic revolution.

Translated by Natasha Wimmer, the prize-winning translator of Roberto Bolano's The Savage Detectives and 2666.

About the Author

Alvaro Enrigue was born in Mexico and lives in New York City. He has taught at New York University, Princeton University, the University of Maryland and Columbia University. Sudden Death - his first novel to be translated into English - was awarded the prestigious Herralde Prize in Spain, the Elena Poniatowska International Novel Award in Mexico, and the Barcelona Prize for Fiction.