Saga of Brutes draws together three confronting and darkly comic
stories: "Between Dog Fights and Hog Slaughter," "The Dirty Work of
Others," and "carbo animalis," published in one volume for the first
time. Ana Paula Maia's no-holds barred narrative pulls few punches,
describing a shocking reality of the lives of the invisible workingmen
who, like Atlas, are forced to carry society's burdens. These heroes of
vile circumstance--coal miners, firemen, garbage collectors, crematorium
workers--are the soot-covered supermen who risk their lives performing
difficult and dangerous work for others. But in the end, they, too,
amount to nothing but carbo animalis--notwithstanding the impure
relation of coal to diamonds. Despite their straightforwardness, Ana
Paula Maia's stories are filled with great insight and compassion for
the lives of the men who live on the edge of a society built with their
own sweat.