To survive, the narrator adopts a mask of boyhood. She watches the women of her neighborhood—both the cisgender mothers fighting for their families and the marginalized trans women working the streets—to understand what it means to be a woman. The novel follows her painful, beautiful, and turbulent journey toward self-actualization, breaking free from the "bad habit" of living a lie. Key Themes Explored in the Novel
Because the emotional weight of the book is heavy, being able to adjust fonts, text sizes, and background lighting (such as dark mode) makes for a more comfortable, personalized reading experience on long nights. La mala costumbre - Alana S. Portero.epub
The narrator describes the experience of being a girl trapped in a body that doesn't feel like her own, a conflict that defines her entire existence. She is forced to navigate a world where her reality is constantly denied, protected only by an imposed masculinity that acts as both a necessary shield and a "iron maiden". The novel follows her journey from the devastated streets of San Blas, ravaged by heroin addiction, to the clandestine nights of downtown Madrid in the 1990s. On this journey, which the book describes as a "bastard version of the hero's journey," she encounters junkies, pop divas, and fallen angels, all while seeking to understand her identity and survive the violence she faces at every turn. To survive, the narrator adopts a mask of boyhood
Alana S. Portero’s debut novel, La mala costumbre , is more than a simple coming-of-age story; it is a "trans bildungsroman" that intertwines the visceral reality of working-class Madrid with the mythic struggles of self-realization. By setting the narrative against the backdrop of the post-Francoist heroin epidemic and the gritty streets of the San Blas neighborhood, Portero elevates the struggle for identity into a universal "odyssey" for belonging. Key Themes Explored in the Novel Because the