Marcela Dantés

Marcela Dantés was born in Belo Horizonte in 1986. She studied Social Communication and graduated in Creative Processes at the Pontifical Catholic University of Minas Gerais. Her first book, a short story collection named SOBRE PESSOAS NORMAIS (ABOUT NORMAL PEOPLE), was published by Patuá in 2016 and was a semifinalist to the Oceanos Award in 2017.
Also in 2016, she was a writer-in-residence at FOLIO, the International Literary Festival of Óbidos, in Portugal. NEM SINAL DE ASAS (NO SIGN OF WINGS), her first novel, was published by Patuá in 2020 and was a finalist as best debut novel to the Jabuti Award in 2021. It was followed by JOÃO MARIA MATILDE, successfully published by Contemporânea/Autêntica in May 2022. Her third novel, VENTO VAZIO (HOLLOW WIND), was published by Companhia das Letras in 2024.
HOLLOW WIND (VENTO VAZIO)
HOLLOW WIND takes place at the end of the world, in the forgotten village of Quina da Capivara. There, four residents shaken by the sudden and mysterious closure of the local Wind Power Plant begin to speculate and build the most diverse theories about the strange events that led to the end of the company’s activities, seeking to find answers in their own personal dramas to the enigma.
Everyone is affected by the effects of “vento vazio”, a local wind known for driving people crazy. In the fragile balance between sanity and madness, they can only watch what was a promise of development turn into an uncomfortable void.

Publication/Status: Published by Companhia das Letras (Brazil) in 2024.
JOÃO MARIA MATILDE
Close to 40 years old, Matilde is a strong and independent woman, who never knew her father. One day, she receives a phone call that turns her life upside down. Her unknown father, João Maria, had passed away and left her a will in Portugal. His friend and lawyer Pedro calls Matilde requesting her presence in a small village across the ocean. She leaves behind her boyfriend, Abel, and her Alzheimer suffering- mother, Beatriz, and departs to Portugal determined to learn everything about that parent whose existence was so new to her.
There, while she deals with the bureaucracy of the will, she takes an unexpected and solitary dive into her own unfamiliar past. Psychologically vulnerable, Matilde feels she must overcome her greatest fears, her panic syndrome, and delirious episodes that insist on happening when her mind needs clarity the most. In search for her origins, she finds a surprising, emotional and transformative version of herself and her story precisely in her father’s homeland.

Publication/Status: Published by Contemporânea/Autêntica (Brazil) in May 2022. [158 pages]
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