Is this an Illness or an Accident?
Posted by Daniela Elza on Oct 28 2024
My debut essay/memoir collection is now up for pre-orders on Caitlin Press website. It is quite exciting to put this work together into a book and to have my first non-fiction, non-poetry collection come out into the world. Though it is also a poetic, and lyrical collection in my eyes.
Is This an Illness or an Accident?
Expected to ship in March, 2025.
Here is the description on the publisher’s website. Book cover is forthcoming.
In her debut prose collection, Daniela Elza gives voice to the “third culture child”—born in one culture, raised in another, building her life in a third—capturing the whole through fragments of significance.
Description
When asked, “But where are you really from?” Daniela Elza responds with a challenge: “How much time do you have?”
Is This an Illness or an Accident? is a profound exploration of belonging, identity, and the question of home. Drawing on the bleak and occasionally absurd moments encountered in being forced to label oneself on document after document, Daniela Elza’s evocative memoir challenges the conventional narrative of cultural integration, focusing instead on the concept of the world citizen. Elza’s allegiance is not to a single country, but to the land, the trees, and soil of our shared planet, pushing back against the rising tides of nationalism and tribalism. The way nature cannot be hacked into its parts and expected to function, this book captures an ecology of being and identity. Not only do the facets of who we are need to collaborate within each of us in an ecosystem of being and thought, but we also need to collaborate amongst each other for our survival.
This book explores the conflicts and contradictions of what it means to belong, to work, and to find home. It questions societal practices, challenges the status quo, and insists on the complexity of our identities. With a curious and critical eye, Elza captures the beauty of the moment while refusing to be confined by others’ definitions.
Through her unique perspective, Elza reframes the conversation around identity, urging us to see ourselves as wholes, far more interesting and intricate than our separate parts. Is This an Illness or an Accident? is a timely and necessary read for anyone grappling with the notions of belonging, identity and symbiosis in an increasingly divided world.
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On the site there is a drop down SHOP LOCAL menu, where you can preorder the book at your local bookstore, or your favourite independent and neighbourhood bookstore.
Thank you to The Queen’s Quarterly (times four), subTerrain, GRAIN Magazine, About Land Journal, Motherwell, UNTIL Magazine, and Mother Tongue Publishing for taking a chance on these essays. And thank you Caitlin Press for seeing them through in a book collection.
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