I loved the first quarter of this book...Ms Swann described Buenos Aires, it's charm, it's mystery and its seduction in such wonderful detail that I was hooked. I cannot wait to visit! then, as the story progressed, she lost the thread of how the environment influenced the characters and I really started to lose interest! the characters weren't rich enough or different enough to stand alone outside the city, the lay of this foreign land. I finished the story, which was neither coming of age nor filled with any groundbreaking self-discovery, but more because I was still searching for the richness of the original environment narrative. I was really looking forward to reading this book as it had been highly recommended in one of the magazines I read that has book reviews (can't really remember which one). I had been to Buenos Aires a couple of years back and found it to be an incredible city, a little schizo, very European in many ways, but third world at the same time. Buenos Aires is like a beautiful woman who has aged - her bones are good, but she is shabby and worn. In many ways that was one of the premises of the book, that Argentians had this strange reaction to foreigners, both pride in their city but this feeling of inferiority as well. Otherwise though I thought the characters were totally unbelievable and for the most part, unlikeable. I kept waiting for something interesting that would grab me to happen but it didn't. The storyline was thin. I probably would have not finished the book except it was a short and I kept thinking it would improve.
What do You think about The Foreigners (2011)?
I was not as excited about Buenos Aires after reading this.... kind of dull.
—lolita
A bit odd and meandering, but a decent subway read.
—yossra
