Neon South is an off-the-beaten-path Latin American travel narrative that unfolds like a novel, shadowing locals all too aware of how outside influences, from colonialism to globalism, have changed their lives.
From the drug cartel-controlled squares of Mexico to Venezuelan jungles where the outside world threatens traditions, Marko Pogacar absorbs all he encounters with the eyes and words of a poet, finding humor in the absurd and intimacy in despair.
Unexpected similarities surface in the assemblage of these tropical experiences fused together with Pogacar's memories of living through the dissolution of Yugoslavia: "After all, are our customs, our kingdoms, our churches and wars, our arsons and human sacrifices one iota different from the Aztec ones?"
"The work reads more like poetry that has gotten lost in fiction . . . Like spots in a pointillist painting, the people and places of narrative form points of reference that multiply and layer to depict a much larger, interconnected world. The vastness of history becomes intimate and personal."
