A review by bennyandthejets420
Amulet by Roberto Bolaño

4.0

Maybe the last in a trilogy consisting of Distant Star and By Night in Chile. Of the three narrators, all are trapped in some way but Auxilio is the one determined to make the best of their situation. I'm less certain of what happens in the end of this one as I am in the other two. The language shifts into a symbolic register that feels less like some kind of message of hope or melancholy for Latin America as a whole. If the main protagonist in Distant Star is a witness and the main protagonist is a co-conspirator (maybe unwittingly) By Night in Chile, than Auxilio is a kind of visionary, who sees further ahead in some way. Also this reveals what the title of 2666 means, namely a doomed trash fire future street where everything is death. Chilling and just as unsettling as the others, but I think the protagonist ends up okay to the others. Despite having witnessed the horrors of the military takeover of the Ciudad Universitaria.