One of the Best Books of 2024 according to Babelia / El País

"This story coming into your lives is no coincidence. It means you're prepared to understand that no snowflake falls on the wrong place," the narrator—who has just begun working as a plumber—tells us. On his way to visit a client who swears he hears water in one of the walls of his house—a phantom leak, because there is no trace of humidity—he stops in front of the window of a cultural center that is hosting an exhibition. In the empty room, the artist takes down one of her paintings and does something unexpected. The artist's name is Clara, and the narrator is enraptured by that action, which will become the start of a story of love and codependence with torturous limits. At the same time, the protagonist discovers the shady dealings at the top of the plumbers' guild, to which he has just been admitted.

Leading the guild, which meets at the Platón bar, is the powerful Ventura. And between unrequited love and uncovered corruption, a series of perhaps unprecedented events take place in which a dying mentor named Ovidio, a Porsche, a Machiavellian art critic named Renata Walas, a rented coffin, a son seeking revenge, a telescopic saw, and the popular cake festival are all involved.

Light and profound, elusive and solid, hilarious and serious, this completely one-of-a-kind novel that displays a slippery and delightful sense of humor throws us some transcendental questions: what is art? What is its mission? How can we give meaning to life? What is love? Is what happens to us due to destiny or coincidence? Is there logic to chance? The author, a fascinating literary rara avis, presents us with a game that is in no way innocent that begins from the novel's paradoxical title.

“Halfway between the profession of love and the love of the profession, Clara y confusa creates a provincial world as extravagant as the pipes taken care of by its protagonist, the faithful and long-suffering suitor of a conceptual artist who is a heroine of denial, and a no less faithful member of a professional union plagued by conspirators and cynical philosophers. Cynthia Rimsky condemns us to perpetual smiles in an ingenious and elaborately simple narrative.” —Gonzalo Ponton Gijón

“Art and love as experiences that synthesize the maximum amount of clarity and the maximum amount of confusion. There is beauty, intelligence, and humor in this book by Cynthia Rimsky. This book of Ovids and plumbers, of poetry and work, in which the most elitist critics praise local pastry festivals. It has been a long time since I had so much fun with a reflection on the tragic and laughable state of literature. (...) Phenomenal.” —Marta Sanz

“In love and in art there is always a mystery and a promise. At least when it comes to true love and art. The promise of an ultimate experience, the one that will lead us to catharsis and an epiphany. A plumber falls in love with a conceptual artist. The test of love, in addition to fulfilling the performance of medieval courtship, could be convincing the most feared art critic to positively value the work of his beloved, opening the door to scholarships, awards, and sales. But the mystery remains: what is art? What is love? What is the potential of popular art? An avant-garde romantic comedy.”
—Juan Pablo Villalobos

“Reading Clara y confusa without a doubt portrays Rimsky as a unique and particularly original writer, one who narrates with a specific perspective on things—and this is the most notorious thing about her, the thing that has allowed her to gradually develop a style and voice that are so recognizable due to how personal and outside of canons and schools her narratives are…It is a romance, a sick love story and, and also a crazy plot of corruption in the plumbers’ guild and the artists’ guild, where the author forges new paths with questions and interrogations that she leaves in the readers’ hands.” —La Opinión de Málaga

“A strange novel, although in that strangeness lies what is probably its greatest success: the desire to read it all the way to the end…A story of love and madness, but also one about corruption, art, village life, and delirium as one of the forms of desire.” —Diego Gándara, La Razón

“Clara y confusa is an excellent and suggestive novel.” —Iñaki Ezquerra, El Correo

“An exquisite author with a solid body of work that has gradually developed a recognizable style, tone, and voice.” —Silvia Friera, Página 12

“Love—what it is, and what its limits are—is one of the main themes in Clara y confusa, which tells the story of a plumber who is an expert at detecting ‘phantom leaks’ and is in love with an artist. Through this story, Rimsky delves into questions such as what art is and what its social mission is, as well as parodies everyday aspects of our society like institutional corruption and the way it permeates society.” —Andrés Seoane, El Mundo

“I’ve been collecting her books little by little and enjoying them one by one. They are always strange, delicate, and filled with minute and perfect details.” —Federico Falco

“A small gem of Chilean literature.” —Martín Parra

“A delicate, precise, and relentless way of narrating.” —Carla Grassi, Infobae

“Rimsky’s style is that of a calm epiphany.” —María Moreno