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4.21 AVERAGE
4.21 AVERAGE
I enjoyed the parts about the spirits, family, resistance, and resiliency. I hate the casualness in which rape is spoken about.
Relentless, brutal and epic. Not sure about the magical realism aspects, but compelling storytelling.
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Heads up: going into this book with an understanding of Allende’s family background and the Pinochet dictatorship in Chile will add a layer of depth you didn’t know you needed. I wish I could erase it from my memory so I could read it again for the first time.
adventurous
dark
emotional
lighthearted
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Isabel Allende does not miss. Ever.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Death, Domestic abuse, Infidelity, Pedophilia, Physical abuse, Rape, Sexual assault, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Torture, Violence, Police brutality, Medical content, Trafficking, Kidnapping, Grief, Car accident, Abortion, Classism
Moderate: Addiction, Animal death, Child abuse, Chronic illness, Infidelity, Mental illness, Miscarriage, Panic attacks/disorders, Violence, Pregnancy, Alcohol, Classism, Deportation
I had to read this book for the book challenge in my school district. While it is not a genre I love to read, I have to say that this is a rich text. I would want my daughters to read it in the context of cultural studies, women's issues and human behavior. Allende is truly an artist at her craft. Also, it should be noted that the violence perpetuated towards women in this book can easily translate to the violence perpetuated in current pop culture-- movies, music videos, etc. It opens the door for mature and educated discussion. I am happy to say that the book challenge was defeated.
The yellowed pages of my paperback copy remind me that I first read this book many years ago. I am not sure whether at that time, I hadn't yet read [b:One Hundred Years of Solitude|320|One Hundred Years of Solitude|Gabriel García Márquez|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327881361l/320._SX50_.jpg|3295655] or simply didn't compare the two. Now, I can see how Isabel Allende played off that famous piece of literature to deepen her story and subtly comment on that of Marquez.
There's the way the word "solitude" shows up as a leitmotif in earlier chapters, and makes its reappearance once or twice at key moments toward the end. There's the way that Allende uses names, totally and consciously different from the way that Marquez did. The women in this book refuse to name their daughters with the same names in each generation, the way the Buendias did, because (they explain) that makes it too hard to follow the story in the histories they are writing.
The family name that does recur is Esteban, like a curse passing down the male line. Senator Esteban Trueba is one kind of homicidal maniac. His great-grandson Esteban Garcia is another. The old man kills out of vanity and wounded pride; the young one, out of rejection and the desire for revenge.
The old Esteban wants to be loved but never understands how. When he takes Clara's dead dog Barabbas and turns his fur into a rug for her, it's grotesque, but it also shows what he is going to do with the country he loves: turn it into something inert and trampled under foot. It's not until he is on the verge of death himself that he can regret both mistaken gestures: the rug and the military coup. And that is when he begins to get his Clara back.
The young Esteban, a bastard child, a descendant of rape, gives himself wholeheartedly to the military dictatorship. He loves nothing. He wants to possess his distant cousin Alba only to show he is as good as the rich man who raped his grandmother and shared his name but not his fortune. He has no illusions that he is doing it for the good of the country, or for any good at all.
Now, there is another name that repeats down the generations: Pedro Garcia. But each Pedro has his own designation (the original Pedro, Pedro Secundo, Pedro Tercero) and his own character (healer, farm manager, musician/revolutionary). Is Allende saying this is the proper way for men to be connected to history, as inheritors who do something new?
The Trueba women have names that remind you of one another but don't sound at all alike: Clara, the clearest; Blanca, the plain white one; and Alba, the noble-sounding version of the word white. Is it having different names that lets them pass the stories along without any anxiety about being forgotten?
Of course, the name Allende is one that the author shares with her famous uncle, the President character in this book. He died in a U.S.-sponsored coup on 9/11/1973, which was the meaning of 9/11 for many on the left before the planes crashed into the Pentagon and the Twin Towers in 2001. He did not die in solitude. Loyalists surrounded him until near the end, when he finally sent them away. The revolution he started lives on, in reality, and in this book in the character of Alba's lover Miguel. (It's a lovely irony that the magical realism of this book shields the romance of Miguel and Alba, because in the house of the spirits, any noise they may make in deserted rooms will be put down to the people of the past walking again.)
It may be true (as Marquez said at the end of his tale) that "races condemned to solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth." Thanks to the women in this book and thanks to its author, and to the art of writing itself, the Chilean socialists and all of us do have that opportunity.
Is it too much to imagine that's the reason Allende wrote this novel, too?
There's the way the word "solitude" shows up as a leitmotif in earlier chapters, and makes its reappearance once or twice at key moments toward the end. There's the way that Allende uses names, totally and consciously different from the way that Marquez did. The women in this book refuse to name their daughters with the same names in each generation, the way the Buendias did, because (they explain) that makes it too hard to follow the story in the histories they are writing.
The family name that does recur is Esteban, like a curse passing down the male line. Senator Esteban Trueba is one kind of homicidal maniac. His great-grandson Esteban Garcia is another. The old man kills out of vanity and wounded pride; the young one, out of rejection and the desire for revenge.
The old Esteban wants to be loved but never understands how. When he takes Clara's dead dog Barabbas and turns his fur into a rug for her, it's grotesque, but it also shows what he is going to do with the country he loves: turn it into something inert and trampled under foot. It's not until he is on the verge of death himself that he can regret both mistaken gestures: the rug and the military coup. And that is when he begins to get his Clara back.
The young Esteban, a bastard child, a descendant of rape, gives himself wholeheartedly to the military dictatorship. He loves nothing. He wants to possess his distant cousin Alba only to show he is as good as the rich man who raped his grandmother and shared his name but not his fortune. He has no illusions that he is doing it for the good of the country, or for any good at all.
Now, there is another name that repeats down the generations: Pedro Garcia. But each Pedro has his own designation (the original Pedro, Pedro Secundo, Pedro Tercero) and his own character (healer, farm manager, musician/revolutionary). Is Allende saying this is the proper way for men to be connected to history, as inheritors who do something new?
The Trueba women have names that remind you of one another but don't sound at all alike: Clara, the clearest; Blanca, the plain white one; and Alba, the noble-sounding version of the word white.
Spoiler
Alba writes this book by referring to her grandmother's notes and her mother's stories--with an occasional interpolation by her grandfather, Esteban Trueba. It's a testament to Isabel Allende's skill and her humanity that the passages in Esteban's voice keep you from taking him for a brute, as brutal as he can act. Those passages make the ending more believable.Of course, the name Allende is one that the author shares with her famous uncle, the President character in this book. He died in a U.S.-sponsored coup on 9/11/1973, which was the meaning of 9/11 for many on the left before the planes crashed into the Pentagon and the Twin Towers in 2001. He did not die in solitude. Loyalists surrounded him until near the end, when he finally sent them away. The revolution he started lives on, in reality, and in this book in the character of Alba's lover Miguel. (It's a lovely irony that the magical realism of this book shields the romance of Miguel and Alba, because in the house of the spirits, any noise they may make in deserted rooms will be put down to the people of the past walking again.)
It may be true (as Marquez said at the end of his tale) that "races condemned to solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth." Thanks to the women in this book and thanks to its author, and to the art of writing itself, the Chilean socialists and all of us do have that opportunity.
My grandmother wrote in her notebooks that bore witness to life for fifty years. Smuggled out by certain friendly spirits, they miraculously escaped the infamous pyre in which so many other family papers perished. I have them here at my feet, bound with colored ribbons, divided according to events and not in chronological order, just as she arranged them before she left. Clara wrote them so they would help me now to reclaim the past and overcome terrors of my own...
Is it too much to imagine that's the reason Allende wrote this novel, too?
I just looked at when I started this book and have to say it's really sad it took me this long to through in the towel. I already could tell as soon as I started the writing was going to drive me bonkers, but it became too much for me to overcome in the end and I stopped reading at 26 percent, or page 125 of 468 in my Kindle version of this book.
What's to say in the end. There were too many characters doing random things that I didn't follow. I know this is a magical realism book, but didn't really see it much in what I read. But I think the wall of text is what was so offputting to me as a reader. There were just whole pages with a block of text and no spacing in between. I had a hard time keeping the sentence straight which hasn't happened to me in a long time.
I know this book is a classic, but in the end it's not just for me.
"The House of the Spirits" follows three generations of the Trueba family, living in Chile. And I could not tell you a single character's name without cheating and going back to the synopsis.
I just found the what I read to be rather flat and colorless and finally jumped back into a memoir I was reading.
What's to say in the end. There were too many characters doing random things that I didn't follow. I know this is a magical realism book, but didn't really see it much in what I read. But I think the wall of text is what was so offputting to me as a reader. There were just whole pages with a block of text and no spacing in between. I had a hard time keeping the sentence straight which hasn't happened to me in a long time.
I know this book is a classic, but in the end it's not just for me.
"The House of the Spirits" follows three generations of the Trueba family, living in Chile. And I could not tell you a single character's name without cheating and going back to the synopsis.
I just found the what I read to be rather flat and colorless and finally jumped back into a memoir I was reading.
challenging
dark
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I didn't have a strong opinion about this book one way or the other. Parts of it were interesting, parts of it dragged on. I absolutely hated the character that brought the 3 women's stories together - Esteban. He was such an unlikeable character, and unfortunately, he was there are every turn. It picks up towards the end, with perhaps too quick of a conclusion. For more and a book-inspired recipe for Beef Empanadas, visit The Hungry Bookworm - https://hungry-bookworm.com/2016/12/17/the-house-of-the-spirits-beef-empanadas/