A review by klaws500
How to Order the Universe by María José Ferrada

4.5

How to Order the Universe: A wonderfully deep story, told with deceptive simplicity. There are so many themes woven expertly through this short novel. It's almost impossibly concise while at the same time containing so much of life. Somehow what the author hasn't written, the white space of the story which is evoked in the large amount of white space on the pages, shines as clearly as what she has written, making the whole much greater than the sum of its parts. It's a remarkably effective composition. M is a child traveling through Chile with her father, a traveling salesman. He keeps her out of school a lot and she considers their travels a sort of parallel education where she learns the tricks of a disappearing trade while people around them also disappear thanks to Pinochet. I loved How to Order the Universe and it will stay with me for some time.