Leaving the Atocha Station

Narrated by an adrift young poet living abroad in Madrid on a fellowship, Leaving the Atocha Station is a novel that explores the extreme self-consciousness, fear of inauthenticity, and emptiness common to so much of modern life. “What is actual when our experiences are mediated by language, technology, medication and the arts?” But what really takes the book to the next level is Lerner’s writing and observations, as small everyday moments are magnified into epiphanies.