'Pretend You're Dead and I Carry You' Review: Julián Delgado Lopera

A lifetime of tragedy and secrets: family curse, generational trauma, or just the fate of being queer in 1990s Colombia? Lambda Literary Award winner Julián Delgado Lopera explores this question in Pretend You’re Dead and I Carry You. Blending literary fiction with a hint of magical realism, Lopera weaves together dual narratives of a father and daughter, two lost souls whose common ground is the very thing that’s keeping them apart, and the community that can save them, if only they let it.

Ignacio is travesti, a distinctly Latin American gender identity that resists easy translation into English-language categories. While Ignacio has leaned on other travestis, he never fully embraced his own identity. Now a widowed father in declining health, he’s reflecting on his past: an abusive, alcoholic dad, a deeply devout mother, and the boy of his Bogotá youth, Felipe, who taught Ignacio to paint his nails, flip his hair, and navigate a new, dangerous way of life.

The family you inherit, the family you find

Meanwhile, 16-year-old Valentina is sick of her unemployed dad moping around the house in his favorite wig, and knows that becoming a famous anchorwoman will change everything. She even stages fake newscasts daily with her Goth best friend Jes (who Valentina would very much like to kiss). The local travesti community has provided all kinds of support since before Valentina was born, despite their complex relationship with Ignacio. But when Valentina’s aunt threatens to take Valentina away, both father and daughter must reckon with an uncertain future.

Penned in lyrical Spanglish, Pretend You’re Dead and I Carry You never apologizes for the characters’ fraught behavior and often brutal treatment of one another. Instead, Lopera presents Ignacio, Valentina, and their biological and chosen family members as human beings navigating a society where machismo reigns supreme and gender roles are set in stone from birth to earth.

The story’s power is exemplified in one of its many beautiful passages: “Mi cielo, we all carry the weight of our doings. And the weight of our doings is nothing but layered pain. But can you blame anyone for trying to run away from pain, can you blame anyone for wanting to be loved?”