The Dangers of Smoking in Bed

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of graphic violence, child death, child abuse, sexual violence, mental illness, child sexual abuse, physical abuse, and death. 

Many of the stories in The Dangers of Smoking in Bed center on an unwelcome past reasserting itself, often in unsettling or supernatural ways. Several characters attempt to suppress traumas, injustices, or wrongdoings, but they fail when the past resurfaces, often in the form of persistent ghosts. These ghosts are reminders that collective and personal traumas cannot stay buried.

The first story in the collection, “Angelita Unearthed,” exemplifies this theme when the narrator’s great aunt, who died as a baby, comes back to haunt her. When Angelita’s bones were dug up, the past was literally “unearthed,” and now the narrator has no choice but to live with it. The dead baby follows her around as a constant reminder that the past will not stay buried. Another story in the collection that features a ghost is “Back When We Talked to the Dead,” which focuses on people who were killed (or “were disappeared,” as the characters say) during Argentina’s ruthless military dictatorship. Once again, the presence of the ghost is a reminder of lingering trauma in the aftermath of these events.