A review by megatsunami
Abril rojo by Santiago Roncagliolo

I was really enjoying this police thriller which weaves in Peruvian legend with the haunting aftermath of the Shining Path terrorist attacks of the late 20th century... until the author decided to use rape as a plot device. Really? Was that necessary? To be clear, there's plenty of gruesome violence all around in this book and I am not saying it's bad to portray violence, but to have your protagonist commit rape, even as a way of showing how he is being affected by the horrors he is witnessing, is just un-called for. Especially given the lack of women characters in this novel. (It's just Edith, mama Mayta Carazo, and Chacaltana's dead mother. That's all.)