Juan Pablo Villalobos


Juan Pablo Villalobos is a Mexican author.
His debut novel, Down the Rabbit Hole, was published by And Other Stories in 2011 and was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award 2011. He is also the author of Quesadillas and I’ll Sell You a Dog.
His fourth novel, I Don’t Expect Anyone to Believe Me, won the Herralde Prize.
He has lived in Mexico and Brazil, and currently resides in Spain with his wife and two children.

Life

Villalobos was born in Guadalajara, Mexico, in 1973. He lived in Barcelona, Spain for eight years, before moving to Brazil. In 2014 he moved back to Barcelona.
He studied marketing and Spanish literature. He has worked in market research and published travel stories, as well as literary and film criticism. Villalobos has researched the influence of the avant-garde on the work of César Aira, and the flexibility of pipelines for electrical installations.

Work

Villalobos's first book, Fiesta en la madriguera 21, has been translated into Portuguese, French, Italian, German, Romanian, Dutch and 421 English. Its English translation, Down the Rabbit Hole by Rosalind Harvey, was published in September 2011 by the London publishing house And Other Stories. Down the Rabbit Hole was shortlisted for the 2011 Guardian First Book Award.
His second novel, , was also translated by Rosalind Harvey and was published by And Other Stories in 2013.
His third novel, I’ll Sell You a Dog, was published by And Other Stories in 2016.
His fourth novel, I Don't Expect Anyone to Believe Me, was published by And Other Stories in the United Kingdom on April 30, 2020, and in the United States on May 5, 2020.

Influences

Villalobos has said that his first book was inspired by Nellie Campobello's collection of short stories set during the Mexican revolution, titled Cartridge.

Reviews

In Germany, Villalobos is recognized as an important representative of the so-called "narco-literature." His book Fiesta en la madriguera has been called "a disillusioned domestic tale from the dark heartland of Latin American machismo".