From the Bookshelf

The Chilean novelist Isabel Allende has been called the most widely read Spanish-language author in the world.  Her books have been translated in more than 40 languages and have sold more than 75 million copies.

She was a cousin of Salvador Allende, the President of Chile who was overthrown and murdered in the military coup led by Augosto Pinochet in 1973.  When she found out that she was on the dictatorship's "wanted list", she went into exile in Venezuela.  She lived there for 13 years and pursued a career as a journalist.  In 1982 she wrote her first novel, "The House of Spirits" which received worldwide acclaim.  She later moved to California where she now lives.

She has written more than twenty books.  I have read quite a few of them, and I consider her one of my favorite writers.

I just finished one of her historical novels, "A Long Petal of the Sea", which was published in 2019.  

The novel is the story of Victor Dalmau and Roser, who becomes his wife out of necessity.  The story opens in 1938 during the Spanish Civil War.  Victor fights against the fascist forces of Francisco Franco, and after he is wounded in battle serves as a medical assistant, treating the victims of the war.  As Franco's army closes in on Barcelona, Victor and Roser escape to France.  Eventually they book passage on a boat to Chile, where they begin a new life.  Victor studies medicine and becomes a highly regarded cardiologist.  But with the military coup in 1973, they once again are faced with the same kind of repressive government from which they had fled Spain decades before.

Migration and asylum, a very timely topic today, is a major theme of the book.  Hatred of immigrants is nothing new.  France was loathe to allow the Spanish refugees to cross the border, and after accepting them, put them in concentration camps.  The conservatives in Chile did not welcome the Spanish immigrants and feared that they were a bunch of communists.

There are parts of this novel, the descriptions of the Civil War, the trek to France, and the Chilean dictatorship, that I think are some of Allende's most powerful writing.  In comparison, there are other parts which seem a bit bland.  All in all, however, it is a very good book and another example of her skill as a storyteller.