Teolinda Gersão’s short-story universe remains one of the most compelling—and consistently unexpected—in recent Portuguese literature.

JOSÉ RIÇO DIREITINHO, Público

Teolinda’s writing brings light into our darkness, even as madness lurks at every moment.

We find ourselves on the other side of the mirror, peering into our own humanity. In fact, the three nouns in the title of these stories may together signify the entirety of the human condition—both in the imaginary worlds of these characters and in the reality of our own lives.

— Vamberto Freitas, Açoriano Oriental

A remarkable architecture in which planes converge and diverge without definitive closure.

A space where there is neither redemption nor punishment, and where, as in any nightmare worthy of the name, nothing ever truly ends. Prantos moves with great dexterity across the vast spectrum of everyday life. From the most turbulent to the seemingly placid, Teolinda’s writing captures the distinct pulse of existence as if it were a single, shared heartbeat.

— Hugo Pinto Santos, Público

An exquisitely refined and mischievous irony, a deeply personal freedom of execution, and an extraordinary variety of registers and narrative voices—all nourished by a prodigious imaginative power.

— Eugénio Lisboa, Jornal de Letras

Teolinda reclaims the short story, placing it within the fascinating realm of demiurgy, weaving imagined plots around lives, relationships, secret desires, losses, disillusionments, resentments, excesses, and perversions. She explores the boundaries of the creative act, intertwining reality and imagination, the event and the possibility of event, the substance of the everyday and the absurd, common sense and madness.

— Clara Rocha, Colóquio/Letras

Behind the Door and Other Stories, by Teolinda Gersão, brings together fourteen small masterpieces under the sign of melancholy. These tales are led by ordinary men and women who try to find a way out of the suffocating routines of daily life and to discover a meaning for existence.
— João de Mancelos, Cintilações: Revista de poesia, ensaio e crítica, 3

Atrás da porta há segredos. De beleza ou de horror, porque o mundo e a vida não são o que parecem. Por vezes a literatura consegue espreitar por uma frincha da porta, ou mesmo forçá-la a abrir-se. Essa tentativa, sempre renovada, é o objectivo da escrita.