What do You think about The Dark Bride (2003)?
I've been wanting to read this novel for a while. There are a lot of interesting Latin American women writers-like Isabel Allende, Laura Esquivel, and Gioconda Belli-who have written in the "magic realism" style started by Gabriel Márguez García back in the Sixties. Laura Restrepo belongs to this group.In some ways, Restrepo has much more in common with the maestro Gabo than the others. Both are from Columbia, and both have a background in journalism. So I thought that she might write in style that reflected the magic of of realism as Gabo did in his later works as opposed to the "realism" of magic with which some of her sisterhood have entertained their readers. The Dark Bride, the 2001 translation by Stephen A. Lytle of Restrepo's 1999 novel La novia oscura, seemed like a good introduction to the writer's work. The book was inspired by a photograph of lovely mestiza that the author found while researching a piece on the exploitation of petroleum workers by (North)American oil companies decades earlier. Restrepo discovered that woman had been one of the prostitutes who had serviced the oil workers years before. Intrigued by the photograph, the author looked into this woman's life and wrote this novel.On the whole, this was it is an excellent novel. In places, however, it has reminded of other great Latin America writer's work-in particular Gabo (of course) and Jorge Amado. In other words, I didn't feel like I heard enough of Restrepo's own voice even though she herself-as the author-was one of the novel's main characters. The novel ends oddly, too. After all the sweat, blood, VD, violence and grittiness throughout the story, the novel concludes in a strangely mystical way. The finish is so warm and fuzzy that it reminds me more of the Assumption of Mary than anything else. The end is to me too cloyingly sweet, sentimental, and sudden. I had to go back and reread the last pages.Like I said, this is mostly an excellent novel. Fans of "magic realism" will enjoy reading it. Th book did intrigue me enough to want to read more by Restrepo. I hope that you'll enjoy it, too.
—Joe Cummings
I read this book in English, the spanish is infinitly(sp) more beautiful. Laura Restrepo is clever, clearly a learned writer. The characters are attractive and salacious and dirty. The social reversal of the strength/power of women within a red-light district vs. them in a greater community, the force and prudence of a religious society, the super-natural hue of Sayonara and the rustic genius of Todos Los Santos all contribute to Restrepo's arsenal of colombian historical-fiction. There are endless pages worth quoting and exotic text painting, something fantastic and special. The plot is thick but the book, over all, is slightley superficial - a great read.
—Joe
Laura Restropo was inspired by the photograph of an unknown woman, reproduced on the book's cover, to write this imagined account of her life. The skinny girl, who becomes the infamously beautiful Sayanora, shows up on the doorstep of the motherly madam Todos los Santos, determined to make her living serving the men from the local oil fields. What is known of her life before and after her time at the bordello La Catunga is revealed piece by piece through 'interviews' with those who knew her best. Each chapter in this intriguing novel reads like a short story, some reaching back to Sayonara's childhood, some illustrating the lives of Sacremento and Payanes, two local oil workers who will touch her life in radically different ways, while others dip into the lives of her fellow prostitutes. The harsh reality of life in the Colombian jungle is given a dark, lyrical quality by Restropo's eloquent prose. With all the twists and turns in the narrative from chapter to chapter, the story can be a bit difficult to follow. This is not a quick read or a feel-good story - it is more of an over experience. In the end, it's well worth the effort.
—Marty
