"Reality . . . Isn't Restricted by This Cell We In", 03 Jul 2008
This was Puig's fourth and best-known novel. It was published in 1976 and translated into English three years later.

Much of the book consisted of dialogue. It, and the shifting from the daily routine of the two main characters in prison to the descriptions of the films, was usually entertaining and kept my interest. The author contrasted the two personalities and their ways of thinking -- political and sensual, engaged and escapist, living for the future and living for the present, "masculine" and "feminine." He showed the two men opposed at first, but moving to accommodate each other as the book progressed. For me, this was shown especially well at the end.

The range of films described was also interesting. Obviously, one can relate the characters in the films -- with their double lives, terrible secrets, covert missions, the search for love and the need to believe in it, love overcoming betrayal and hardship -- to the two in prison.

The amount of space in the book given to films, and later on to the popular songs in the last film, was part of Puig's usual concern, how people use those forms to escape from reality but also elevate their lives, how their understanding of themselves is guided by the forms, with their "tremendous truths."

Toward the book's end, the characters either began speaking the language of the other or acting something like the other. The author also seemed to suggest that an ideal relationship, whatever the members' gender, was one where people kept no secrets from each other. All these things were enjoyable.

A few lengthy interior monologues in the novel weren't understood, and the over-long footnotes on Freud, Reich, Marcuse, Brown and others, or the description of wartime Berlin, often seemed dated and over the top. Much in them concerned the theorists' calls for a new morality and revision of the idea of human nature. Several set up the idea of "perversions" as threats to the "basic repressive principles fundamental to the organization of capitalism." And discussed the need for men to liberate the women locked in the dungeons of their psyche and restructure their views of sexual normality. These footnotes suggested that one of the men, Molina, might be a revolutionary element in his own way.

a tapestry of intrigue, 26 Oct 2007
As other reviewers have stated, this book is set in a prison cell in Argentina . The 2 characters are an unlikely pair, Molina an effeminate homosexual and Valentin a member of a guerrilla organistion. It is a tale of their growing relationship, that the enforcement of the prison cell has foisted upon them.

It is an easy book to read,and while it deals with complex issues, I never felt overwhelmed by them.

From Molina's first story about the Panther woman, who is afraid to kiss her husband, in case she murders him, the theme of love, fear and betrayel are set.

Puig has written a brilliant book, that deserves all the acclaim it has gotten. It will leave you thinking, not only about who we love, but also why we love, and I mean to include ideologies as well as people.

The sub text of Freudian's take on homosexuality is interesting too.

I would recommend to anyone who enjoys a good book, but it does have an adult theme, so be aware of that.

PUIG M., Kiss of the Spider Woman Vintage (New York) 1980 pp 281, 19 Apr 2007
Puig's masterpiece is the story of trust and betrayal that takes place in an Argentinean prison in the 1970s. The two main characters are Molina, imprisoned for homosexuality, and Valentin, a political revolutionary. To help pass time, Molina recounts the stories and memories of his favourite movies. The first of these is the classic noir 'Cat People', and further movies concerning the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France, Zombies and others. This vehicle gives Puig an opportunity to tell stories within stories. Much of the book is written as an exchange of dialogue, more like a piece of drama than a novel, and also includes footnotes that discuss the nature of homosexuality as a psychological condition.
This Freudian environment, with the addition of Puig's astonishing mixture of forms, gives the book its backdrop. Over this background Puig tells us a story of how Molina and Valentin are drawn together by circumstance and then forced apart by fate. In terms of both form and content Kiss of the Spider Woman is a breathtaking and powerful work that is destined to become a modern classic.
Translation by Thomas Colchie



Unexpected twists - amazing book, 18 Dec 2006
Thoroughly post-modern in approach and incredibly innovative, I read this cover to cover in one sitting. Excellent plot development and deliberately disconcerting polyphonic structure with genuinely surprising twists in the tale. Don't be put off by the original (and 'difficult') structure - this book is well worth perservering with.

Wonderful stuff!

An unlikely friendship, and some plot twists..., 15 Aug 2006
"Kiss of the Spider Woman" (1976) is a novel written by Manuel Puig (1932-1990), an Argentinian playwright, novelist and screenwriter. Its subject is controversial, as it delves upon themes such as sexual identity, violence and torture. All the same, I think reading it is worthwhile, as it is one of those books that tell a story that comes alive to the reader...

In case you haven't heard about "Kiss of the Spider Woman", I will tell you a little about its plot. The main characters are Valentin and Molina, two men that share a prison cell, during the Argentinian dictatorship of the late 1970's. Molina is a sensitive soul that happens to be an homosexual, and Valentin a revolutionary that despises the fact that Molina has no political ideas (and is confused by the notion that someone can choose to be gay). Due to the fact that both share the same cell, Valentin and Molina spend some time talking to each other about their ideas and feelings, something they wouldn't have done in any other circumstance. Despite their differences, an unlikely friendship will begin between them, a friendship that may well turn into something more. However, there is more than one twist that will surprise you in this story, even though I won't tell you about that in order not to spoil the surprise.

On the whole, this is an engaging book that is likely to interest the reader, but that is not adequate for children, and that won't appeal to those that don't want to read a book that deals with homosexuality. I liked the way in which Puig told Valentin and Molina's story, and that is the reason why I give it 3.5 stars...

Belen Alcat

"Reality . . . Isn't Restricted by This Cell We In", 03 Jul 2008
This was Puig's fourth and best-known novel. It was published in 1976 and translated into English three years later.

Much of the book consisted of dialogue. It, and the shifting from the daily routine of the two main characters in prison to the descriptions of the films, was usually entertaining and kept my interest. The author contrasted the two personalities and their ways of thinking -- political and sensual, engaged and escapist, living for the future and living for the present, "masculine" and "feminine." He showed the two men opposed at first, but moving to accommodate each other as the book progressed. For me, this was shown especially well at the end.

The range of films described was also interesting. Obviously, one can relate the characters in the films -- with their double lives, terrible secrets, covert missions, the search for love and the need to believe in it, love overcoming betrayal and hardship -- to the two in prison.

The amount of space in the book given to films, and later on to the popular songs in the last film, was part of Puig's usual concern, how people use those forms to escape from reality but also elevate their lives, how their understanding of themselves is guided by the forms, with their "tremendous truths."

Toward the book's end, the characters either began speaking the language of the other or acting something like the other. The author also seemed to suggest that an ideal relationship, whatever the members' gender, was one where people kept no secrets from each other. All these things were enjoyable.

A few lengthy interior monologues in the novel weren't understood, and the over-long footnotes on Freud, Reich, Marcuse, Brown and others, or the description of wartime Berlin, often seemed dated and over the top. Much in them concerned the theorists' calls for a new morality and revision of the idea of human nature. Several set up the idea of "perversions" as threats to the "basic repressive principles fundamental to the organization of capitalism." And discussed the need for men to liberate the women locked in the dungeons of their psyche and restructure their views of sexual normality. These footnotes suggested that one of the men, Molina, might be a revolutionary element in his own way.

a tapestry of intrigue, 26 Oct 2007
As other reviewers have stated, this book is set in a prison cell in Argentina . The 2 characters are an unlikely pair, Molina an effeminate homosexual and Valentin a member of a guerrilla organistion. It is a tale of their growing relationship, that the enforcement of the prison cell has foisted upon them.

It is an easy book to read,and while it deals with complex issues, I never felt overwhelmed by them.

From Molina's first story about the Panther woman, who is afraid to kiss her husband, in case she murders him, the theme of love, fear and betrayel are set.

Puig has written a brilliant book, that deserves all the acclaim it has gotten. It will leave you thinking, not only about who we love, but also why we love, and I mean to include ideologies as well as people.

The sub text of Freudian's take on homosexuality is interesting too.

I would recommend to anyone who enjoys a good book, but it does have an adult theme, so be aware of that.

PUIG M., Kiss of the Spider Woman Vintage (New York) 1980 pp 281, 19 Apr 2007
Puig's masterpiece is the story of trust and betrayal that takes place in an Argentinean prison in the 1970s. The two main characters are Molina, imprisoned for homosexuality, and Valentin, a political revolutionary. To help pass time, Molina recounts the stories and memories of his favourite movies. The first of these is the classic noir 'Cat People', and further movies concerning the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France, Zombies and others. This vehicle gives Puig an opportunity to tell stories within stories. Much of the book is written as an exchange of dialogue, more like a piece of drama than a novel, and also includes footnotes that discuss the nature of homosexuality as a psychological condition.
This Freudian environment, with the addition of Puig's astonishing mixture of forms, gives the book its backdrop. Over this background Puig tells us a story of how Molina and Valentin are drawn together by circumstance and then forced apart by fate. In terms of both form and content Kiss of the Spider Woman is a breathtaking and powerful work that is destined to become a modern classic.
Translation by Thomas Colchie



Unexpected twists - amazing book, 18 Dec 2006
Thoroughly post-modern in approach and incredibly innovative, I read this cover to cover in one sitting. Excellent plot development and deliberately disconcerting polyphonic structure with genuinely surprising twists in the tale. Don't be put off by the original (and 'difficult') structure - this book is well worth perservering with.

Wonderful stuff!

An unlikely friendship, and some plot twists..., 15 Aug 2006
"Kiss of the Spider Woman" (1976) is a novel written by Manuel Puig (1932-1990), an Argentinian playwright, novelist and screenwriter. Its subject is controversial, as it delves upon themes such as sexual identity, violence and torture. All the same, I think reading it is worthwhile, as it is one of those books that tell a story that comes alive to the reader...

In case you haven't heard about "Kiss of the Spider Woman", I will tell you a little about its plot. The main characters are Valentin and Molina, two men that share a prison cell, during the Argentinian dictatorship of the late 1970's. Molina is a sensitive soul that happens to be an homosexual, and Valentin a revolutionary that despises the fact that Molina has no political ideas (and is confused by the notion that someone can choose to be gay). Due to the fact that both share the same cell, Valentin and Molina spend some time talking to each other about their ideas and feelings, something they wouldn't have done in any other circumstance. Despite their differences, an unlikely friendship will begin between them, a friendship that may well turn into something more. However, there is more than one twist that will surprise you in this story, even though I won't tell you about that in order not to spoil the surprise.

On the whole, this is an engaging book that is likely to interest the reader, but that is not adequate for children, and that won't appeal to those that don't want to read a book that deals with homosexuality. I liked the way in which Puig told Valentin and Molina's story, and that is the reason why I give it 3.5 stars...

Belen Alcat

Far too incoherent, 14 Nov 2008
This may have been a more enjoyable, rewarding book with a more straightforward narrative structure but by the time you hit page 20 suddenly everything falls apart. Each new paragraph appears to be shifting onto something completely new and it's never terribly clear who is speaking.
Some of the prose is nice but i don't think this translation is too great.
If i were to pick a page at random of this book i have only recently read, not only would i not be able to tell what was going on, i would have absolutely no recollection of having read that page.
At heart it looks like it might have been a very compelling book but i found it to be virtually unreadable and completely unsatisfying.

A man seeks his father...Pedro Paramo...., 11 Nov 2007

This novel is one of the most highly rated of the 20th c latin-american classics,Gabriel Garcia Marquez wished he had written it and this slim novel has become possibly the first of the great novels from the 1950's

Brevity is the key here,within 122 pages this novel is full of backgrounds and what ifs, as ghosts haunt the streets of Colama,where the despot Pedro Paramo cast his evil eye many years before.

The skill in Rulfo's style is where he manages to make the novel seem longer,small paragraphs follow mini-chapters where the meat of the story is laid.The dying despot sitting as his town starves is a great image, still causing distress even as he is dying.

The clipped style hints at so much more,the lives long faded and the intrigues,murders and deaths. Rulfo manages to bring southern mexico into the northern lands with the rain,the crops,the Villastas and many other small elements in this tale.


Regrettably, Reading This Felt as If Time Had Turned Backward, 13 Oct 2007
Those who like novels where it often doesn't become unclear until the third or fourth read what's happening, who's speaking, who's listening, who's doing what, how most of the characters are related to each other, and how the series of events described are related to each other in time, would enjoy this novel. Otherwise, like me, they might not be able to appreciate it.

Mainly what I could grasp was that a man was looking for his father in a village that was a purgatory for dead sinners, where time turned backward. The father was the local landowner and a tyrant who'd committed many crimes. Eventually the searcher faded from the story. The historical background supplied by some other readers is valuable and enlightening but is immeasurably clearer in their descriptions than in the novel itself.

The novel consisted mostly of dialogue, with the features described above. There were also descriptions of the village and its surroundings. The atmosphere of the hot, bleak land and death and of the hopelessness of the characters was powerful. But for this reader, the book didn't need to continue for 120 pages. I might've been able to appreciate this surrealist masterpiece if it had been something closer in form to a short story, like some of the works in the same author's The Burning Plain, such as "Tell Them Not to Kill Me!" or "The Man."

Lost in translation, 23 May 2007
In her introduction Susan Sontag says that Garcia Marquez memorised the whole of 'Pedro Paramo'. She claims the book as a classic of world literature. And she remarks how - before he died - the author had personally told her that he wanted an "accurate and uncut English translation". If true, then Juan Rulfo will even now be out of his grave and haunting the publishers in the time-honoured 'magical realist' style. For this is a poor translation with basic grammatical errors ("She must of thought I'd forsaken her" and "I wondered if she were crazy"). The undifferentiated dialogue, strained poetic effects and complete absence of humour combine to give the effect of a confused, drab, and amateur radio play. Some might discern the shadow of an intelligent and allusive story behind the clumsy text, but this edition is of use mainly for students on a 'magical realism' course who can't read Spanish.

A Mexican masterpiece, 16 Mar 2007
You may not have heard of Juan Rulfo, but you've more than likely heard of the writers for whom his novella Pedro Páramo was a revelation - Márquez in particular, but also Fuentes, Asturias, Paz. It is a story with a deceptively simple plot: a man promises his dying mother that he will return to Comala, the town where she once lived, to meet his father, Pedro Páramo. So begins a story built on the experiences and reflections of different characters - alive and dead - narrating at different periods of time, whether in the days of Pedro Páramo's melancholy childhood, his rise as a despot, or the subsequent decline of Comala into a literal ghost town. In some sense a dictator novel, in others a family saga, a ghost tale or even a love story, Pedro Páramo is compulsive because of Rulfo's skill at conveying atmosphere, scene and believable irreality - what was later to be known as magic realism. The book is alive; terrible as it is, Comala is brilliantly painted and its inhabitants gritty, fatalistic and haunting. An indisputable classic of huge influence.

"Reality . . . Isn't Restricted by This Cell We In", 03 Jul 2008
This was Puig's fourth and best-known novel. It was published in 1976 and translated into English three years later.

Much of the book consisted of dialogue. It, and the shifting from the daily routine of the two main characters in prison to the descriptions of the films, was usually entertaining and kept my interest. The author contrasted the two personalities and their ways of thinking -- political and sensual, engaged and escapist, living for the future and living for the present, "masculine" and "feminine." He showed the two men opposed at first, but moving to accommodate each other as the book progressed. For me, this was shown especially well at the end.

The range of films described was also interesting. Obviously, one can relate the characters in the films -- with their double lives, terrible secrets, covert missions, the search for love and the need to believe in it, love overcoming betrayal and hardship -- to the two in prison.

The amount of space in the book given to films, and later on to the popular songs in the last film, was part of Puig's usual concern, how people use those forms to escape from reality but also elevate their lives, how their understanding of themselves is guided by the forms, with their "tremendous truths."

Toward the book's end, the characters either began speaking the language of the other or acting something like the other. The author also seemed to suggest that an ideal relationship, whatever the members' gender, was one where people kept no secrets from each other. All these things were enjoyable.

A few lengthy interior monologues in the novel weren't understood, and the over-long footnotes on Freud, Reich, Marcuse, Brown and others, or the description of wartime Berlin, often seemed dated and over the top. Much in them concerned the theorists' calls for a new morality and revision of the idea of human nature. Several set up the idea of "perversions" as threats to the "basic repressive principles fundamental to the organization of capitalism." And discussed the need for men to liberate the women locked in the dungeons of their psyche and restructure their views of sexual normality. These footnotes suggested that one of the men, Molina, might be a revolutionary element in his own way.

a tapestry of intrigue, 26 Oct 2007
As other reviewers have stated, this book is set in a prison cell in Argentina . The 2 characters are an unlikely pair, Molina an effeminate homosexual and Valentin a member of a guerrilla organistion. It is a tale of their growing relationship, that the enforcement of the prison cell has foisted upon them.

It is an easy book to read,and while it deals with complex issues, I never felt overwhelmed by them.

From Molina's first story about the Panther woman, who is afraid to kiss her husband, in case she murders him, the theme of love, fear and betrayel are set.

Puig has written a brilliant book, that deserves all the acclaim it has gotten. It will leave you thinking, not only about who we love, but also why we love, and I mean to include ideologies as well as people.

The sub text of Freudian's take on homosexuality is interesting too.

I would recommend to anyone who enjoys a good book, but it does have an adult theme, so be aware of that.

PUIG M., Kiss of the Spider Woman Vintage (New York) 1980 pp 281, 19 Apr 2007
Puig's masterpiece is the story of trust and betrayal that takes place in an Argentinean prison in the 1970s. The two main characters are Molina, imprisoned for homosexuality, and Valentin, a political revolutionary. To help pass time, Molina recounts the stories and memories of his favourite movies. The first of these is the classic noir 'Cat People', and further movies concerning the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France, Zombies and others. This vehicle gives Puig an opportunity to tell stories within stories. Much of the book is written as an exchange of dialogue, more like a piece of drama than a novel, and also includes footnotes that discuss the nature of homosexuality as a psychological condition.
This Freudian environment, with the addition of Puig's astonishing mixture of forms, gives the book its backdrop. Over this background Puig tells us a story of how Molina and Valentin are drawn together by circumstance and then forced apart by fate. In terms of both form and content Kiss of the Spider Woman is a breathtaking and powerful work that is destined to become a modern classic.
Translation by Thomas Colchie



Unexpected twists - amazing book, 18 Dec 2006
Thoroughly post-modern in approach and incredibly innovative, I read this cover to cover in one sitting. Excellent plot development and deliberately disconcerting polyphonic structure with genuinely surprising twists in the tale. Don't be put off by the original (and 'difficult') structure - this book is well worth perservering with.

Wonderful stuff!

An unlikely friendship, and some plot twists..., 15 Aug 2006
"Kiss of the Spider Woman" (1976) is a novel written by Manuel Puig (1932-1990), an Argentinian playwright, novelist and screenwriter. Its subject is controversial, as it delves upon themes such as sexual identity, violence and torture. All the same, I think reading it is worthwhile, as it is one of those books that tell a story that comes alive to the reader...

In case you haven't heard about "Kiss of the Spider Woman", I will tell you a little about its plot. The main characters are Valentin and Molina, two men that share a prison cell, during the Argentinian dictatorship of the late 1970's. Molina is a sensitive soul that happens to be an homosexual, and Valentin a revolutionary that despises the fact that Molina has no political ideas (and is confused by the notion that someone can choose to be gay). Due to the fact that both share the same cell, Valentin and Molina spend some time talking to each other about their ideas and feelings, something they wouldn't have done in any other circumstance. Despite their differences, an unlikely friendship will begin between them, a friendship that may well turn into something more. However, there is more than one twist that will surprise you in this story, even though I won't tell you about that in order not to spoil the surprise.

On the whole, this is an engaging book that is likely to interest the reader, but that is not adequate for children, and that won't appeal to those that don't want to read a book that deals with homosexuality. I liked the way in which Puig told Valentin and Molina's story, and that is the reason why I give it 3.5 stars...

Belen Alcat

Far too incoherent, 14 Nov 2008
This may have been a more enjoyable, rewarding book with a more straightforward narrative structure but by the time you hit page 20 suddenly everything falls apart. Each new paragraph appears to be shifting onto something completely new and it's never terribly clear who is speaking.
Some of the prose is nice but i don't think this translation is too great.
If i were to pick a page at random of this book i have only recently read, not only would i not be able to tell what was going on, i would have absolutely no recollection of having read that page.
At heart it looks like it might have been a very compelling book but i found it to be virtually unreadable and completely unsatisfying.

A man seeks his father...Pedro Paramo...., 11 Nov 2007

This novel is one of the most highly rated of the 20th c latin-american classics,Gabriel Garcia Marquez wished he had written it and this slim novel has become possibly the first of the great novels from the 1950's

Brevity is the key here,within 122 pages this novel is full of backgrounds and what ifs, as ghosts haunt the streets of Colama,where the despot Pedro Paramo cast his evil eye many years before.

The skill in Rulfo's style is where he manages to make the novel seem longer,small paragraphs follow mini-chapters where the meat of the story is laid.The dying despot sitting as his town starves is a great image, still causing distress even as he is dying.

The clipped style hints at so much more,the lives long faded and the intrigues,murders and deaths. Rulfo manages to bring southern mexico into the northern lands with the rain,the crops,the Villastas and many other small elements in this tale.


Regrettably, Reading This Felt as If Time Had Turned Backward, 13 Oct 2007
Those who like novels where it often doesn't become unclear until the third or fourth read what's happening, who's speaking, who's listening, who's doing what, how most of the characters are related to each other, and how the series of events described are related to each other in time, would enjoy this novel. Otherwise, like me, they might not be able to appreciate it.

Mainly what I could grasp was that a man was looking for his father in a village that was a purgatory for dead sinners, where time turned backward. The father was the local landowner and a tyrant who'd committed many crimes. Eventually the searcher faded from the story. The historical background supplied by some other readers is valuable and enlightening but is immeasurably clearer in their descriptions than in the novel itself.

The novel consisted mostly of dialogue, with the features described above. There were also descriptions of the village and its surroundings. The atmosphere of the hot, bleak land and death and of the hopelessness of the characters was powerful. But for this reader, the book didn't need to continue for 120 pages. I might've been able to appreciate this surrealist masterpiece if it had been something closer in form to a short story, like some of the works in the same author's The Burning Plain, such as "Tell Them Not to Kill Me!" or "The Man."

Lost in translation, 23 May 2007
In her introduction Susan Sontag says that Garcia Marquez memorised the whole of 'Pedro Paramo'. She claims the book as a classic of world literature. And she remarks how - before he died - the author had personally told her that he wanted an "accurate and uncut English translation". If true, then Juan Rulfo will even now be out of his grave and haunting the publishers in the time-honoured 'magical realist' style. For this is a poor translation with basic grammatical errors ("She must of thought I'd forsaken her" and "I wondered if she were crazy"). The undifferentiated dialogue, strained poetic effects and complete absence of humour combine to give the effect of a confused, drab, and amateur radio play. Some might discern the shadow of an intelligent and allusive story behind the clumsy text, but this edition is of use mainly for students on a 'magical realism' course who can't read Spanish.

A Mexican masterpiece, 16 Mar 2007
You may not have heard of Juan Rulfo, but you've more than likely heard of the writers for whom his novella Pedro Páramo was a revelation - Márquez in particular, but also Fuentes, Asturias, Paz. It is a story with a deceptively simple plot: a man promises his dying mother that he will return to Comala, the town where she once lived, to meet his father, Pedro Páramo. So begins a story built on the experiences and reflections of different characters - alive and dead - narrating at different periods of time, whether in the days of Pedro Páramo's melancholy childhood, his rise as a despot, or the subsequent decline of Comala into a literal ghost town. In some sense a dictator novel, in others a family saga, a ghost tale or even a love story, Pedro Páramo is compulsive because of Rulfo's skill at conveying atmosphere, scene and believable irreality - what was later to be known as magic realism. The book is alive; terrible as it is, Comala is brilliantly painted and its inhabitants gritty, fatalistic and haunting. An indisputable classic of huge influence.

Do you want to be bad?, 02 Sep 2008
Curiously gripping, poignant and soulful. This book entertained but also challenged my thinking on permanence. One loves, the other is loved. One loses the other chooses when to be found. One is, the other creates personae.

Some good bad girl's bits too.

I found this easy to read but beautifully written, a good story, but with plenty to reflect on. I recommend it.

Weakest offering yet., 02 Sep 2008
For me, this is definitely Vargas Llosa's weakest offering yet. Although entertaining enough, and written with his undeniable skill and style, this latest novel is well short of Vargas Llosa's normal high standards.
Essentially this novel is a story following the inextricably linked lives of the 2 main characters, across various continents and decades. Disappointingly, however, the underlying theme of the novel seems to be the author's desire to demonstrate his knowledge of all the countries in which he himself has lived over the various decades, rather than having any great story to tell. The story itself is threadbare, a poor man's Love in the Time of Cholera, and is essentially a ridiculous sequence of coincidental meetings between the writer and the nina mala. The novel crescendos to a farcical level, when the protagonist has a chance meeting with the nina's father in Peru.
Normally so insightful and probing, Vargas Llosa spends little time or care in examining or describing characters outside of the central plot.
Once I have overcome my disappointment, I will re-read some of his other works, so as not to leave a bitter taste in my mouth.

Worth reading but nowhere near his best, 15 May 2008
I keep changing my mind about this book - I can't decide if it is a good book that narrowly misses being very good, or an average book that narrowly misses being quite bad.

I've been reading Vargas Llosa for over twenty years - this is the eleventh of his books that I've read. In terms of style this is the most conventional of those eleven - had it not had his name on the front I wouldn't have recognized it as his - gone are the multiple narratives and dazzling, non-sequential time shifts. I miss them. They made novels like The Green House and The Storyteller hard but rewarding reads. This book was hard work at times as well but not for the same reasons. Deliberately "bad" writing is a dangerous device and Vargas Llosa overuses it here. At least I'm assuming that it is deliberately bad, because some of it is so facile that a writer of Vargas Llosa's quality and a translator of Edith Grossman's experience couldn't have up with some of the dross that is served up, (particularly in the early parts of the book, to link the periods when the "bad girl" appears) without deliberation. The description of "swinging London" is so bad that it sounds like it was written by a fourteen year-old - although even the squarest 14 year-old is unlikely to have come up with a list of London "trend setters" that includes Cliff Richard. This is presumably done for effect, to bring the novel to life when the Bad Girl appears but is also asks the reader to put up with a lot that they wouldn't tolerate from an unknown author.

Some people have said that they find the character of the Bad Girl either unbelievable or so unappealing that it is hard to persevere with the novel - or to understand what the narrator sees in her. I disagree - I've known a few women like the Bad Girl and can quite understand the narrator's obsession. However, your reaction may depend upon what you feel an author's representation of an individual suggests about their opinion of a group. It would be possible to write a feminist interpretation of this novel suggesting that the author's depiction of a strong, sexually independent woman being physically and mentally destroyed as a result of this independence is simple male wish fulfilment - the desire to destroy something which is both desirable and terrifying (add the fact that they first time the couple make love he is "too big" for her and that in his sixties he has a relationship with a much younger woman and the case for this being a novel of male wish-fulfilment looks increasingly strong!). Couple this with the fact that the only gay character dies of AIDS and you could make a convincing case that his was a very conservative and reactionary novel. I don't think it is, but one could make a case that way.

Is it all bad? No. Personally I found the Bad Girl an fascinating character and the relationship believable. Also, as an expat myself, I found Vargas Llosa's description of the narrator's dislocation from both his homeland and his adopted home very real. It is possible to read the novel as an allegory of a writer's career, as N. Megahey's says, although it is interesting that I've never seen Varags Llosa say this in any interviews about the book. If so, it is a bit heavy handed - I prefer to read it as a love story and a fable about the dangers of always wanting something more, something unatainable, something better than we have.

In short - I really wanted to love this book, as I have most of Vargas Llosa's work. I didn't - I enjoyed it, but doubt that I will read it again. I almost gave it four stars out of loyalty and affection for the author's previous work - but to be honest, if this had been the first of his novels that I'd read I probably wouldn't have bothered to pick up his earlier work.


The writer's curse, 13 Feb 2008
In its passion for love, life and writing, Mario Vargas Llosa's latest novel returns brilliantly to the inspirations of one of his best novels 'Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter'. In 'The Bad Girl', an idealistic young man leaves Miraflores in Peru with no greater ambition than to spend the rest of his years living in the most beautiful city in the world, Paris. He is content to be nothing more than a humble translator and interpreter as long as it allows him to remain there, but a mysterious beautiful woman from his past turns up unexpectedly, and his life never again knows a moment's peace. Despite the torments she puts him through over the subsequent decades, he is continually unable to resist her charms.

There is little doubt that the desirable but uncontrollable 'bad girl' is nothing more than Ricardo's muse, the vital impulse to interact with life and write about it - each of her appearances coinciding with a new decade and new stage in the opening up of narrator's life. Even when the author is describing the most passionate of love scenes with the irresistible 'bad girl', you suspect that the only banging going on in all those hotel rooms and Parisian garrets is on a typewriter.

It sounds like a clever conceit, and anyone failing to catch the subtle literary subtext will undoubtedly struggle to get past the apparent coincidences of Ricardo's encounters, or the superficial treatment of the political content, but Vargas Llosa makes it all completely relevant and meaningful through his passionate and brilliant writing. 'The Bad Girl' is a dazzling, entertaining and deeply poignant work that, whether you are a writer or not, sums up the need to wholeheartedly embrace life, to make the most of the friendships that come your way, accepting all the joys and the heartaches that enrich the experience.

"You're my praying mantis... The female insect devours the male while he's making love to her. He dies happy, apparently.", 25 Oct 2007
(4.5 stars) In 1950, when Ricardo Somocurcio first meets Lily, a "Chilean" exotic in Lima, Peru, he is fifteen, sure of only one thing--that she is the most bewitching creature he has ever known. His young infatuation eventually develops into a lifelong obsession, and his story of how Lily dominates all aspects of his romantic life for more than forty years shows both the mysterious power of unconditional love and the peril of misplaced devotion. Lily is a will-o'-the-wisp, appearing and vanishing, changing names, following the lure of power to revolutionary Cuba, the lure of wealth to Paris, and eventually the lure of both power and wealth to Japan, where her lover is a high ranking yakuza sadist. Somehow, however, she always makes her way back to Ricardo, whom she professes not to love, despite, or perhaps because of, his unquestioned acceptance of her humiliations of him.

From Lima to Paris, London, and Madrid, the story of the "bad girl" and the "good boy" unfolds, exploring all aspects of love and betrayal within the changing settings and political climates of the various countries in which the two have commitments. Whether it be revolutionary Cuba, to which Lily goes as Comrade Arlette; the Tupac Amaru guerilla movement in Peru, where some of Ricardo's friends battle the government; the French revolutionary movement which brought about the downfall of Charles DeGaulle; or the various United Nations conferences in the 1970s and 1980s, which Ricardo attends as a UNESCO translator, love, politics, and violence exist side by side.

Though author Mario Vargas Llosa bases the plot of his book on novels by Flaubert (Madame Bovary and A Sentimental Education), he makes Lily an individual--a femme fatale who forever drops in and then out of Ricardo's life--and any parallels with the Flaubert novels remain in the background.Lily, or whatever name she uses when she bursts in on his life, is a product of her times, a woman whose sexual freedom allows her to pursue whatever pleases her, whether that means having an affair with a Cuban leader or engaging in kinky sex with a Japanese gangster. She has no qualms about using Ricardo to solve problems when she is desperate--and then moving on, disappearing unexpectedly and leaving him bereft--as usual. His constant acceptance of her behavior may make him a problematic protagonist for some readers.

Vargas Llosa, whose fascination with politics permeates many of his novels, broadens the perspective of this novel beyond that of a love story by tying many of the characters' experiences to revolutionary politics, paying particular attention to Peruvian strongmen from 1960 to 1990. Drawing loose parallels between the bad girl, who represents Ricardo's constantly dashed (and always revitalized) hopes, and political candidates who promise the world and fail to deliver, he sets scenes and brings his characters to life in intense, vibrant prose. Though Vargas Llosa focuses on two people, the bad girl and the good boy, he creates a world around them that is so fully realized that their lives take on symbolic significance: the praying mantis has many parallels in life, love, and politics. Mary Whipple

"Reality . . . Isn't Restricted by This Cell We In", 03 Jul 2008
This was Puig's fourth and best-known novel. It was published in 1976 and translated into English three years later.

Much of the book consisted of dialogue. It, and the shifting from the daily routine of the two main characters in prison to the descriptions of the films, was usually entertaining and kept my interest. The author contrasted the two personalities and their ways of thinking -- political and sensual, engaged and escapist, living for the future and living for the present, "masculine" and "feminine." He showed the two men opposed at first, but moving to accommodate each other as the book progressed. For me, this was shown especially well at the end.

The range of films described was also interesting. Obviously, one can relate the characters in the films -- with their double lives, terrible secrets, covert missions, the search for love and the need to believe in it, love overcoming betrayal and hardship -- to the two in prison.

The amount of space in the book given to films, and later on to the popular songs in the last film, was part of Puig's usual concern, how people use those forms to escape from reality but also elevate their lives, how their understanding of themselves is guided by the forms, with their "tremendous truths."

Toward the book's end, the characters either began speaking the language of the other or acting something like the other. The author also seemed to suggest that an ideal relationship, whatever the members' gender, was one where people kept no secrets from each other. All these things were enjoyable.

A few lengthy interior monologues in the novel weren't understood, and the over-long footnotes on Freud, Reich, Marcuse, Brown and others, or the description of wartime Berlin, often seemed dated and over the top. Much in them concerned the theorists' calls for a new morality and revision of the idea of human nature. Several set up the idea of "perversions" as threats to the "basic repressive principles fundamental to the organization of capitalism." And discussed the need for men to liberate the women locked in the dungeons of their psyche and restructure their views of sexual normality. These footnotes suggested that one of the men, Molina, might be a revolutionary element in his own way.

a tapestry of intrigue, 26 Oct 2007
As other reviewers have stated, this book is set in a prison cell in Argentina . The 2 characters are an unlikely pair, Molina an effeminate homosexual and Valentin a member of a guerrilla organistion. It is a tale of their growing relationship, that the enforcement of the prison cell has foisted upon them.

It is an easy book to read,and while it deals with complex issues, I never felt overwhelmed by them.

From Molina's first story about the Panther woman, who is afraid to kiss her husband, in case she murders him, the theme of love, fear and betrayel are set.

Puig has written a brilliant book, that deserves all the acclaim it has gotten. It will leave you thinking, not only about who we love, but also why we love, and I mean to include ideologies as well as people.

The sub text of Freudian's take on homosexuality is interesting too.

I would recommend to anyone who enjoys a good book, but it does have an adult theme, so be aware of that.

PUIG M., Kiss of the Spider Woman Vintage (New York) 1980 pp 281, 19 Apr 2007
Puig's masterpiece is the story of trust and betrayal that takes place in an Argentinean prison in the 1970s. The two main characters are Molina, imprisoned for homosexuality, and Valentin, a political revolutionary. To help pass time, Molina recounts the stories and memories of his favourite movies. The first of these is the classic noir 'Cat People', and further movies concerning the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France, Zombies and others. This vehicle gives Puig an opportunity to tell stories within stories. Much of the book is written as an exchange of dialogue, more like a piece of drama than a novel, and also includes footnotes that discuss the nature of homosexuality as a psychological condition.
This Freudian environment, with the addition of Puig's astonishing mixture of forms, gives the book its backdrop. Over this background Puig tells us a story of how Molina and Valentin are drawn together by circumstance and then forced apart by fate. In terms of both form and content Kiss of the Spider Woman is a breathtaking and powerful work that is destined to become a modern classic.
Translation by Thomas Colchie



Unexpected twists - amazing book, 18 Dec 2006
Thoroughly post-modern in approach and incredibly innovative, I read this cover to cover in one sitting. Excellent plot development and deliberately disconcerting polyphonic structure with genuinely surprising twists in the tale. Don't be put off by the original (and 'difficult') structure - this book is well worth perservering with.

Wonderful stuff!

An unlikely friendship, and some plot twists..., 15 Aug 2006
"Kiss of the Spider Woman" (1976) is a novel written by Manuel Puig (1932-1990), an Argentinian playwright, novelist and screenwriter. Its subject is controversial, as it delves upon themes such as sexual identity, violence and torture. All the same, I think reading it is worthwhile, as it is one of those books that tell a story that comes alive to the reader...

In case you haven't heard about "Kiss of the Spider Woman", I will tell you a little about its plot. The main characters are Valentin and Molina, two men that share a prison cell, during the Argentinian dictatorship of the late 1970's. Molina is a sensitive soul that happens to be an homosexual, and Valentin a revolutionary that despises the fact that Molina has no political ideas (and is confused by the notion that someone can choose to be gay). Due to the fact that both share the same cell, Valentin and Molina spend some time talking to each other about their ideas and feelings, something they wouldn't have done in any other circumstance. Despite their differences, an unlikely friendship will begin between them, a friendship that may well turn into something more. However, there is more than one twist that will surprise you in this story, even though I won't tell you about that in order not to spoil the surprise.

On the whole, this is an engaging book that is likely to interest the reader, but that is not adequate for children, and that won't appeal to those that don't want to read a book that deals with homosexuality. I liked the way in which Puig told Valentin and Molina's story, and that is the reason why I give it 3.5 stars...

Belen Alcat

Far too incoherent, 14 Nov 2008
This may have been a more enjoyable, rewarding book with a more straightforward narrative structure but by the time you hit page 20 suddenly everything falls apart. Each new paragraph appears to be shifting onto something completely new and it's never terribly clear who is speaking.
Some of the prose is nice but i don't think this translation is too great.
If i were to pick a page at random of this book i have only recently read, not only would i not be able to tell what was going on, i would have absolutely no recollection of having read that page.
At heart it looks like it might have been a very compelling book but i found it to be virtually unreadable and completely unsatisfying.

A man seeks his father...Pedro Paramo...., 11 Nov 2007

This novel is one of the most highly rated of the 20th c latin-american classics,Gabriel Garcia Marquez wished he had written it and this slim novel has become possibly the first of the great novels from the 1950's

Brevity is the key here,within 122 pages this novel is full of backgrounds and what ifs, as ghosts haunt the streets of Colama,where the despot Pedro Paramo cast his evil eye many years before.

The skill in Rulfo's style is where he manages to make the novel seem longer,small paragraphs follow mini-chapters where the meat of the story is laid.The dying despot sitting as his town starves is a great image, still causing distress even as he is dying.

The clipped style hints at so much more,the lives long faded and the intrigues,murders and deaths. Rulfo manages to bring southern mexico into the northern lands with the rain,the crops,the Villastas and many other small elements in this tale.


Regrettably, Reading This Felt as If Time Had Turned Backward, 13 Oct 2007
Those who like novels where it often doesn't become unclear until the third or fourth read what's happening, who's speaking, who's listening, who's doing what, how most of the characters are related to each other, and how the series of events described are related to each other in time, would enjoy this novel. Otherwise, like me, they might not be able to appreciate it.

Mainly what I could grasp was that a man was looking for his father in a village that was a purgatory for dead sinners, where time turned backward. The father was the local landowner and a tyrant who'd committed many crimes. Eventually the searcher faded from the story. The historical background supplied by some other readers is valuable and enlightening but is immeasurably clearer in their descriptions than in the novel itself.

The novel consisted mostly of dialogue, with the features described above. There were also descriptions of the village and its surroundings. The atmosphere of the hot, bleak land and death and of the hopelessness of the characters was powerful. But for this reader, the book didn't need to continue for 120 pages. I might've been able to appreciate this surrealist masterpiece if it had been something closer in form to a short story, like some of the works in the same author's The Burning Plain, such as "Tell Them Not to Kill Me!" or "The Man."

Lost in translation, 23 May 2007
In her introduction Susan Sontag says that Garcia Marquez memorised the whole of 'Pedro Paramo'. She claims the book as a classic of world literature. And she remarks how - before he died - the author had personally told her that he wanted an "accurate and uncut English translation". If true, then Juan Rulfo will even now be out of his grave and haunting the publishers in the time-honoured 'magical realist' style. For this is a poor translation with basic grammatical errors ("She must of thought I'd forsaken her" and "I wondered if she were crazy"). The undifferentiated dialogue, strained poetic effects and complete absence of humour combine to give the effect of a confused, drab, and amateur radio play. Some might discern the shadow of an intelligent and allusive story behind the clumsy text, but this edition is of use mainly for students on a 'magical realism' course who can't read Spanish.

A Mexican masterpiece, 16 Mar 2007
You may not have heard of Juan Rulfo, but you've more than likely heard of the writers for whom his novella Pedro Páramo was a revelation - Márquez in particular, but also Fuentes, Asturias, Paz. It is a story with a deceptively simple plot: a man promises his dying mother that he will return to Comala, the town where she once lived, to meet his father, Pedro Páramo. So begins a story built on the experiences and reflections of different characters - alive and dead - narrating at different periods of time, whether in the days of Pedro Páramo's melancholy childhood, his rise as a despot, or the subsequent decline of Comala into a literal ghost town. In some sense a dictator novel, in others a family saga, a ghost tale or even a love story, Pedro Páramo is compulsive because of Rulfo's skill at conveying atmosphere, scene and believable irreality - what was later to be known as magic realism. The book is alive; terrible as it is, Comala is brilliantly painted and its inhabitants gritty, fatalistic and haunting. An indisputable classic of huge influence.

Do you want to be bad?, 02 Sep 2008
Curiously gripping, poignant and soulful. This book entertained but also challenged my thinking on permanence. One loves, the other is loved. One loses the other chooses when to be found. One is, the other creates personae.

Some good bad girl's bits too.

I found this easy to read but beautifully written, a good story, but with plenty to reflect on. I recommend it.

Weakest offering yet., 02 Sep 2008
For me, this is definitely Vargas Llosa's weakest offering yet. Although entertaining enough, and written with his undeniable skill and style, this latest novel is well short of Vargas Llosa's normal high standards.
Essentially this novel is a story following the inextricably linked lives of the 2 main characters, across various continents and decades. Disappointingly, however, the underlying theme of the novel seems to be the author's desire to demonstrate his knowledge of all the countries in which he himself has lived over the various decades, rather than having any great story to tell. The story itself is threadbare, a poor man's Love in the Time of Cholera, and is essentially a ridiculous sequence of coincidental meetings between the writer and the nina mala. The novel crescendos to a farcical level, when the protagonist has a chance meeting with the nina's father in Peru.
Normally so insightful and probing, Vargas Llosa spends little time or care in examining or describing characters outside of the central plot.
Once I have overcome my disappointment, I will re-read some of his other works, so as not to leave a bitter taste in my mouth.

Worth reading but nowhere near his best, 15 May 2008
I keep changing my mind about this book - I can't decide if it is a good book that narrowly misses being very good, or an average book that narrowly misses being quite bad.

I've been reading Vargas Llosa for over twenty years - this is the eleventh of his books that I've read. In terms of style this is the most conventional of those eleven - had it not had his name on the front I wouldn't have recognized it as his - gone are the multiple narratives and dazzling, non-sequential time shifts. I miss them. They made novels like The Green House and The Storyteller hard but rewarding reads. This book was hard work at times as well but not for the same reasons. Deliberately "bad" writing is a dangerous device and Vargas Llosa overuses it here. At least I'm assuming that it is deliberately bad, because some of it is so facile that a writer of Vargas Llosa's quality and a translator of Edith Grossman's experience couldn't have up with some of the dross that is served up, (particularly in the early parts of the book, to link the periods when the "bad girl" appears) without deliberation. The description of "swinging London" is so bad that it sounds like it was written by a fourteen year-old - although even the squarest 14 year-old is unlikely to have come up with a list of London "trend setters" that includes Cliff Richard. This is presumably done for effect, to bring the novel to life when the Bad Girl appears but is also asks the reader to put up with a lot that they wouldn't tolerate from an unknown author.

Some people have said that they find the character of the Bad Girl either unbelievable or so unappealing that it is hard to persevere with the novel - or to understand what the narrator sees in her. I disagree - I've known a few women like the Bad Girl and can quite understand the narrator's obsession. However, your reaction may depend upon what you feel an author's representation of an individual suggests about their opinion of a group. It would be possible to write a feminist interpretation of this novel suggesting that the author's depiction of a strong, sexually independent woman being physically and mentally destroyed as a result of this independence is simple male wish fulfilment - the desire to destroy something which is both desirable and terrifying (add the fact that they first time the couple make love he is "too big" for her and that in his sixties he has a relationship with a much younger woman and the case for this being a novel of male wish-fulfilment looks increasingly strong!). Couple this with the fact that the only gay character dies of AIDS and you could make a convincing case that his was a very conservative and reactionary novel. I don't think it is, but one could make a case that way.

Is it all bad? No. Personally I found the Bad Girl an fascinating character and the relationship believable. Also, as an expat myself, I found Vargas Llosa's description of the narrator's dislocation from both his homeland and his adopted home very real. It is possible to read the novel as an allegory of a writer's career, as N. Megahey's says, although it is interesting that I've never seen Varags Llosa say this in any interviews about the book. If so, it is a bit heavy handed - I prefer to read it as a love story and a fable about the dangers of always wanting something more, something unatainable, something better than we have.

In short - I really wanted to love this book, as I have most of Vargas Llosa's work. I didn't - I enjoyed it, but doubt that I will read it again. I almost gave it four stars out of loyalty and affection for the author's previous work - but to be honest, if this had been the first of his novels that I'd read I probably wouldn't have bothered to pick up his earlier work.


The writer's curse, 13 Feb 2008
In its passion for love, life and writing, Mario Vargas Llosa's latest novel returns brilliantly to the inspirations of one of his best novels 'Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter'. In 'The Bad Girl', an idealistic young man leaves Miraflores in Peru with no greater ambition than to spend the rest of his years living in the most beautiful city in the world, Paris. He is content to be nothing more than a humble translator and interpreter as long as it allows him to remain there, but a mysterious beautiful woman from his past turns up unexpectedly, and his life never again knows a moment's peace. Despite the torments she puts him through over the subsequent decades, he is continually unable to resist her charms.

There is little doubt that the desirable but uncontrollable 'bad girl' is nothing more than Ricardo's muse, the vital impulse to interact with life and write about it - each of her appearances coinciding with a new decade and new stage in the opening up of narrator's life. Even when the author is describing the most passionate of love scenes with the irresistible 'bad girl', you suspect that the only banging going on in all those hotel rooms and Parisian garrets is on a typewriter.

It sounds like a clever conceit, and anyone failing to catch the subtle literary subtext will undoubtedly struggle to get past the apparent coincidences of Ricardo's encounters, or the superficial treatment of the political content, but Vargas Llosa makes it all completely relevant and meaningful through his passionate and brilliant writing. 'The Bad Girl' is a dazzling, entertaining and deeply poignant work that, whether you are a writer or not, sums up the need to wholeheartedly embrace life, to make the most of the friendships that come your way, accepting all the joys and the heartaches that enrich the experience.

"You're my praying mantis... The female insect devours the male while he's making love to her. He dies happy, apparently.", 25 Oct 2007
(4.5 stars) In 1950, when Ricardo Somocurcio first meets Lily, a "Chilean" exotic in Lima, Peru, he is fifteen, sure of only one thing--that she is the most bewitching creature he has ever known. His young infatuation eventually develops into a lifelong obsession, and his story of how Lily dominates all aspects of his romantic life for more than forty years shows both the mysterious power of unconditional love and the peril of misplaced devotion. Lily is a will-o'-the-wisp, appearing and vanishing, changing names, following the lure of power to revolutionary Cuba, the lure of wealth to Paris, and eventually the lure of both power and wealth to Japan, where her lover is a high ranking yakuza sadist. Somehow, however, she always makes her way back to Ricardo, whom she professes not to love, despite, or perhaps because of, his unquestioned acceptance of her humiliations of him.

From Lima to Paris, London, and Madrid, the story of the "bad girl" and the "good boy" unfolds, exploring all aspects of love and betrayal within the changing settings and political climates of the various countries in which the two have commitments. Whether it be revolutionary Cuba, to which Lily goes as Comrade Arlette; the Tupac Amaru guerilla movement in Peru, where some of Ricardo's friends battle the government; the French revolutionary movement which brought about the downfall of Charles DeGaulle; or the various United Nations conferences in the 1970s and 1980s, which Ricardo attends as a UNESCO translator, love, politics, and violence exist side by side.

Though author Mario Vargas Llosa bases the plot of his book on novels by Flaubert (Madame Bovary and A Sentimental Education), he makes Lily an individual--a femme fatale who forever drops in and then out of Ricardo's life--and any parallels with the Flaubert novels remain in the background.Lily, or whatever name she uses when she bursts in on his life, is a product of her times, a woman whose sexual freedom allows her to pursue whatever pleases her, whether that means having an affair with a Cuban leader or engaging in kinky sex with a Japanese gangster. She has no qualms about using Ricardo to solve problems when she is desperate--and then moving on, disappearing unexpectedly and leaving him bereft--as usual. His constant acceptance of her behavior may make him a problematic protagonist for some readers.

Vargas Llosa, whose fascination with politics permeates many of his novels, broadens the perspective of this novel beyond that of a love story by tying many of the characters' experiences to revolutionary politics, paying particular attention to Peruvian strongmen from 1960 to 1990. Drawing loose parallels between the bad girl, who represents Ricardo's constantly dashed (and always revitalized) hopes, and political candidates who promise the world and fail to deliver, he sets scenes and brings his characters to life in intense, vibrant prose. Though Vargas Llosa focuses on two people, the bad girl and the good boy, he creates a world around them that is so fully realized that their lives take on symbolic significance: the praying mantis has many parallels in life, love, and politics. Mary Whipple


very deep and incredible to act, 16 Feb 2001
what a fabulous play. It is so deep and it gives such an accurate portrayl of a woman undertaking the final stages of recovery from an incident that has scarred her for life. It is everyones wish to meet their tormenter from when they were young - this book describes the sinister triumph of a woman settling the score. I loved acting it.

A play for our age, 18 Oct 2000
Death and the Maiden is one of those plays that become instant classics. It is almost like a Greek tragedy in that it deals with so much with so little effort- torture, rape,revenge, guilt, truth. It is a play that is un-cluttered with stage directions, which, if one has a good imagination, leaves room for your mind to explore the world that Dorfman creates and allows you to imagine what the characters are doing... It only has 3 characters which really makes it interesting- Dorfman keeps the tension and the drama going for the whole play while he has only these 3 characters to write about. This play hits home hard, because whether you've been raped, tortured or not, Dorfman has created characters that have elements of us all- you'll recognise yourself in at least one aspect of one character... This is a play that asks you for answers- so it is using you as an instrument in its own "life" as an interesting aspect of theatre. One for the imaginative.

"Reality . . . Isn't Restricted by This Cell We In", 03 Jul 2008
This was Puig's fourth and best-known novel. It was published in 1976 and translated into English three years later.

Much of the book consisted of dialogue. It, and the shifting from the daily routine of the two main characters in prison to the descriptions of the films, was usually entertaining and kept my interest. The author contrasted the two personalities and their ways of thinking -- political and sensual, engaged and escapist, living for the future and living for the present, "masculine" and "feminine." He showed the two men opposed at first, but moving to accommodate each other as the book progressed. For me, this was shown especially well at the end.

The range of films described was also interesting. Obviously, one can relate the characters in the films -- with their double lives, terrible secrets, covert missions, the search for love and the need to believe in it, love overcoming betrayal and hardship -- to the two in prison.

The amount of space in the book given to films, and later on to the popular songs in the last film, was part of Puig's usual concern, how people use those forms to escape from reality but also elevate their lives, how their understanding of themselves is guided by the forms, with their "tremendous truths."

Toward the book's end, the characters either began speaking the language of the other or acting something like the other. The author also seemed to suggest that an ideal relationship, whatever the members' gender, was one where people kept no secrets from each other. All these things were enjoyable.

A few lengthy interior monologues in the novel weren't understood, and the over-long footnotes on Freud, Reich, Marcuse, Brown and others, or the description of wartime Berlin, often seemed dated and over the top. Much in them concerned the theorists' calls for a new morality and revision of the idea of human nature. Several set up the idea of "perversions" as threats to the "basic repressive principles fundamental to the organization of capitalism." And discussed the need for men to liberate the women locked in the dungeons of their psyche and restructure their views of sexual normality. These footnotes suggested that one of the men, Molina, might be a revolutionary element in his own way.

a tapestry of intrigue, 26 Oct 2007
As other reviewers have stated, this book is set in a prison cell in Argentina . The 2 characters are an unlikely pair, Molina an effeminate homosexual and Valentin a member of a guerrilla organistion. It is a tale of their growing relationship, that the enforcement of the prison cell has foisted upon them.

It is an easy book to read,and while it deals with complex issues, I never felt overwhelmed by them.

From Molina's first story about the Panther woman, who is afraid to kiss her husband, in case she murders him, the theme of love, fear and betrayel are set.

Puig has written a brilliant book, that deserves all the acclaim it has gotten. It will leave you thinking, not only about who we love, but also why we love, and I mean to include ideologies as well as people.

The sub text of Freudian's take on homosexuality is interesting too.

I would recommend to anyone who enjoys a good book, but it does have an adult theme, so be aware of that.

PUIG M., Kiss of the Spider Woman Vintage (New York) 1980 pp 281, 19 Apr 2007
Puig's masterpiece is the story of trust and betrayal that takes place in an Argentinean prison in the 1970s. The two main characters are Molina, imprisoned for homosexuality, and Valentin, a political revolutionary. To help pass time, Molina recounts the stories and memories of his favourite movies. The first of these is the classic noir 'Cat People', and further movies concerning the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France, Zombies and others. This vehicle gives Puig an opportunity to tell stories within stories. Much of the book is written as an exchange of dialogue, more like a piece of drama than a novel, and also includes footnotes that discuss the nature of homosexuality as a psychological condition.
This Freudian environment, with the addition of Puig's astonishing mixture of forms, gives the book its backdrop. Over this background Puig tells us a story of how Molina and Valentin are drawn together by circumstance and then forced apart by fate. In terms of both form and content Kiss of the Spider Woman is a breathtaking and powerful work that is destined to become a modern classic.
Translation by Thomas Colchie



Unexpected twists - amazing book, 18 Dec 2006
Thoroughly post-modern in approach and incredibly innovative, I read this cover to cover in one sitting. Excellent plot development and deliberately disconcerting polyphonic structure with genuinely surprising twists in the tale. Don't be put off by the original (and 'difficult') structure - this book is well worth perservering with.

Wonderful stuff!

An unlikely friendship, and some plot twists..., 15 Aug 2006
"Kiss of the Spider Woman" (1976) is a novel written by Manuel Puig (1932-1990), an Argentinian playwright, novelist and screenwriter. Its subject is controversial, as it delves upon themes such as sexual identity, violence and torture. All the same, I think reading it is worthwhile, as it is one of those books that tell a story that comes alive to the reader...

In case you haven't heard about "Kiss of the Spider Woman", I will tell you a little about its plot. The main characters are Valentin and Molina, two men that share a prison cell, during the Argentinian dictatorship of the late 1970's. Molina is a sensitive soul that happens to be an homosexual, and Valentin a revolutionary that despises the fact that Molina has no political ideas (and is confused by the notion that someone can choose to be gay). Due to the fact that both share the same cell, Valentin and Molina spend some time talking to each other about their ideas and feelings, something they wouldn't have done in any other circumstance. Despite their differences, an unlikely friendship will begin between them, a friendship that may well turn into something more. However, there is more than one twist that will surprise you in this story, even though I won't tell you about that in order not to spoil the surprise.

On the whole, this is an engaging book that is likely to interest the reader, but that is not adequate for children, and that won't appeal to those that don't want to read a book that deals with homosexuality. I liked the way in which Puig told Valentin and Molina's story, and that is the reason why I give it 3.5 stars...

Belen Alcat

Far too incoherent, 14 Nov 2008
This may have been a more enjoyable, rewarding book with a more straightforward narrative structure but by the time you hit page 20 suddenly everything falls apart. Each new paragraph appears to be shifting onto something completely new and it's never terribly clear who is speaking.
Some of the prose is nice but i don't think this translation is too great.
If i were to pick a page at random of this book i have only recently read, not only would i not be able to tell what was going on, i would have absolutely no recollection of having read that page.
At heart it looks like it might have been a very compelling book but i found it to be virtually unreadable and completely unsatisfying.

A man seeks his father...Pedro Paramo...., 11 Nov 2007

This novel is one of the most highly rated of the 20th c latin-american classics,Gabriel Garcia Marquez wished he had written it and this slim novel has become possibly the first of the great novels from the 1950's

Brevity is the key here,within 122 pages this novel is full of backgrounds and what ifs, as ghosts haunt the streets of Colama,where the despot Pedro Paramo cast his evil eye many years before.

The skill in Rulfo's style is where he manages to make the novel seem longer,small paragraphs follow mini-chapters where the meat of the story is laid.The dying despot sitting as his town starves is a great image, still causing distress even as he is dying.

The clipped style hints at so much more,the lives long faded and the intrigues,murders and deaths. Rulfo manages to bring southern mexico into the northern lands with the rain,the crops,the Villastas and many other small elements in this tale.


Regrettably, Reading This Felt as If Time Had Turned Backward, 13 Oct 2007
Those who like novels where it often doesn't become unclear until the third or fourth read what's happening, who's speaking, who's listening, who's doing what, how most of the characters are related to each other, and how the series of events described are related to each other in time, would enjoy this novel. Otherwise, like me, they might not be able to appreciate it.

Mainly what I could grasp was that a man was looking for his father in a village that was a purgatory for dead sinners, where time turned backward. The father was the local landowner and a tyrant who'd committed many crimes. Eventually the searcher faded from the story. The historical background supplied by some other readers is valuable and enlightening but is immeasurably clearer in their descriptions than in the novel itself.

The novel consisted mostly of dialogue, with the features described above. There were also descriptions of the village and its surroundings. The atmosphere of the hot, bleak land and death and of the hopelessness of the characters was powerful. But for this reader, the book didn't need to continue for 120 pages. I might've been able to appreciate this surrealist masterpiece if it had been something closer in form to a short story, like some of the works in the same author's The Burning Plain, such as "Tell Them Not to Kill Me!" or "The Man."

Lost in translation, 23 May 2007
In her introduction Susan Sontag says that Garcia Marquez memorised the whole of 'Pedro Paramo'. She claims the book as a classic of world literature. And she remarks how - before he died - the author had personally told her that he wanted an "accurate and uncut English translation". If true, then Juan Rulfo will even now be out of his grave and haunting the publishers in the time-honoured 'magical realist' style. For this is a poor translation with basic grammatical errors ("She must of thought I'd forsaken her" and "I wondered if she were crazy"). The undifferentiated dialogue, strained poetic effects and complete absence of humour combine to give the effect of a confused, drab, and amateur radio play. Some might discern the shadow of an intelligent and allusive story behind the clumsy text, but this edition is of use mainly for students on a 'magical realism' course who can't read Spanish.

A Mexican masterpiece, 16 Mar 2007
You may not have heard of Juan Rulfo, but you've more than likely heard of the writers for whom his novella Pedro Páramo was a revelation - Márquez in particular, but also Fuentes, Asturias, Paz. It is a story with a deceptively simple plot: a man promises his dying mother that he will return to Comala, the town where she once lived, to meet his father, Pedro Páramo. So begins a story built on the experiences and reflections of different characters - alive and dead - narrating at different periods of time, whether in the days of Pedro Páramo's melancholy childhood, his rise as a despot, or the subsequent decline of Comala into a literal ghost town. In some sense a dictator novel, in others a family saga, a ghost tale or even a love story, Pedro Páramo is compulsive because of Rulfo's skill at conveying atmosphere, scene and believable irreality - what was later to be known as magic realism. The book is alive; terrible as it is, Comala is brilliantly painted and its inhabitants gritty, fatalistic and haunting. An indisputable classic of huge influence.

Do you want to be bad?, 02 Sep 2008
Curiously gripping, poignant and soulful. This book entertained but also challenged my thinking on permanence. One loves, the other is loved. One loses the other chooses when to be found. One is, the other creates personae.

Some good bad girl's bits too.

I found this easy to read but beautifully written, a good story, but with plenty to reflect on. I recommend it.

Weakest offering yet., 02 Sep 2008
For me, this is definitely Vargas Llosa's weakest offering yet. Although entertaining enough, and written with his undeniable skill and style, this latest novel is well short of Vargas Llosa's normal high standards.
Essentially this novel is a story following the inextricably linked lives of the 2 main characters, across various continents and decades. Disappointingly, however, the underlying theme of the novel seems to be the author's desire to demonstrate his knowledge of all the countries in which he himself has lived over the various decades, rather than having any great story to tell. The story itself is threadbare, a poor man's Love in the Time of Cholera, and is essentially a ridiculous sequence of coincidental meetings between the writer and the nina mala. The novel crescendos to a farcical level, when the protagonist has a chance meeting with the nina's father in Peru.
Normally so insightful and probing, Vargas Llosa spends little time or care in examining or describing characters outside of the central plot.
Once I have overcome my disappointment, I will re-read some of his other works, so as not to leave a bitter taste in my mouth.

Worth reading but nowhere near his best, 15 May 2008
I keep changing my mind about this book - I can't decide if it is a good book that narrowly misses being very good, or an average book that narrowly misses being quite bad.

I've been reading Vargas Llosa for over twenty years - this is the eleventh of his books that I've read. In terms of style this is the most conventional of those eleven - had it not had his name on the front I wouldn't have recognized it as his - gone are the multiple narratives and dazzling, non-sequential time shifts. I miss them. They made novels like The Green House and The Storyteller hard but rewarding reads. This book was hard work at times as well but not for the same reasons. Deliberately "bad" writing is a dangerous device and Vargas Llosa overuses it here. At least I'm assuming that it is deliberately bad, because some of it is so facile that a writer of Vargas Llosa's quality and a translator of Edith Grossman's experience couldn't have up with some of the dross that is served up, (particularly in the early parts of the book, to link the periods when the "bad girl" appears) without deliberation. The description of "swinging London" is so bad that it sounds like it was written by a fourteen year-old - although even the squarest 14 year-old is unlikely to have come up with a list of London "trend setters" that includes Cliff Richard. This is presumably done for effect, to bring the novel to life when the Bad Girl appears but is also asks the reader to put up with a lot that they wouldn't tolerate from an unknown author.

Some people have said that they find the character of the Bad Girl either unbelievable or so unappealing that it is hard to persevere with the novel - or to understand what the narrator sees in her. I disagree - I've known a few women like the Bad Girl and can quite understand the narrator's obsession. However, your reaction may depend upon what you feel an author's representation of an individual suggests about their opinion of a group. It would be possible to write a feminist interpretation of this novel suggesting that the author's depiction of a strong, sexually independent woman being physically and mentally destroyed as a result of this independence is simple male wish fulfilment - the desire to destroy something which is both desirable and terrifying (add the fact that they first time the couple make love he is "too big" for her and that in his sixties he has a relationship with a much younger woman and the case for this being a novel of male wish-fulfilment looks increasingly strong!). Couple this with the fact that the only gay character dies of AIDS and you could make a convincing case that his was a very conservative and reactionary novel. I don't think it is, but one could make a case that way.

Is it all bad? No. Personally I found the Bad Girl an fascinating character and the relationship believable. Also, as an expat myself, I found Vargas Llosa's description of the narrator's dislocation from both his homeland and his adopted home very real. It is possible to read the novel as an allegory of a writer's career, as N. Megahey's says, although it is interesting that I've never seen Varags Llosa say this in any interviews about the book. If so, it is a bit heavy handed - I prefer to read it as a love story and a fable about the dangers of always wanting something more, something unatainable, something better than we have.

In short - I really wanted to love this book, as I have most of Vargas Llosa's work. I didn't - I enjoyed it, but doubt that I will read it again. I almost gave it four stars out of loyalty and affection for the author's previous work - but to be honest, if this had been the first of his novels that I'd read I probably wouldn't have bothered to pick up his earlier work.


The writer's curse, 13 Feb 2008
In its passion for love, life and writing, Mario Vargas Llosa's latest novel returns brilliantly to the inspirations of one of his best novels 'Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter'. In 'The Bad Girl', an idealistic young man leaves Miraflores in Peru with no greater ambition than to spend the rest of his years living in the most beautiful city in the world, Paris. He is content to be nothing more than a humble translator and interpreter as long as it allows him to remain there, but a mysterious beautiful woman from his past turns up unexpectedly, and his life never again knows a moment's peace. Despite the torments she puts him through over the subsequent decades, he is continually unable to resist her charms.

There is little doubt that the desirable but uncontrollable 'bad girl' is nothing more than Ricardo's muse, the vital impulse to interact with life and write about it - each of her appearances coinciding with a new decade and new stage in the opening up of narrator's life. Even when the author is describing the most passionate of love scenes with the irresistible 'bad girl', you suspect that the only banging going on in all those hotel rooms and Parisian garrets is on a typewriter.

It sounds like a clever conceit, and anyone failing to catch the subtle literary subtext will undoubtedly struggle to get past the apparent coincidences of Ricardo's encounters, or the superficial treatment of the political content, but Vargas Llosa makes it all completely relevant and meaningful through his passionate and brilliant writing. 'The Bad Girl' is a dazzling, entertaining and deeply poignant work that, whether you are a writer or not, sums up the need to wholeheartedly embrace life, to make the most of the friendships that come your way, accepting all the joys and the heartaches that enrich the experience.

"You're my praying mantis... The female insect devours the male while he's making love to her. He dies happy, apparently.", 25 Oct 2007
(4.5 stars) In 1950, when Ricardo Somocurcio first meets Lily, a "Chilean" exotic in Lima, Peru, he is fifteen, sure of only one thing--that she is the most bewitching creature he has ever known. His young infatuation eventually develops into a lifelong obsession, and his story of how Lily dominates all aspects of his romantic life for more than forty years shows both the mysterious power of unconditional love and the peril of misplaced devotion. Lily is a will-o'-the-wisp, appearing and vanishing, changing names, following the lure of power to revolutionary Cuba, the lure of wealth to Paris, and eventually the lure of both power and wealth to Japan, where her lover is a high ranking yakuza sadist. Somehow, however, she always makes her way back to Ricardo, whom she professes not to love, despite, or perhaps because of, his unquestioned acceptance of her humiliations of him.

From Lima to Paris, London, and Madrid, the story of the "bad girl" and the "good boy" unfolds, exploring all aspects of love and betrayal within the changing settings and political climates of the various countries in which the two have commitments. Whether it be revolutionary Cuba, to which Lily goes as Comrade Arlette; the Tupac Amaru guerilla movement in Peru, where some of Ricardo's friends battle the government; the French revolutionary movement which brought about the downfall of Charles DeGaulle; or the various United Nations conferences in the 1970s and 1980s, which Ricardo attends as a UNESCO translator, love, politics, and violence exist side by side.

Though author Mario Vargas Llosa bases the plot of his book on novels by Flaubert (Madame Bovary and A Sentimental Education), he makes Lily an individual--a femme fatale who forever drops in and then out of Ricardo's life--and any parallels with the Flaubert novels remain in the background.Lily, or whatever name she uses when she bursts in on his life, is a product of her times, a woman whose sexual freedom allows her to pursue whatever pleases her, whether that means having an affair with a Cuban leader or engaging in kinky sex with a Japanese gangster. She has no qualms about using Ricardo to solve problems when she is desperate--and then moving on, disappearing unexpectedly and leaving him bereft--as usual. His constant acceptance of her behavior may make him a problematic protagonist for some readers.

Vargas Llosa, whose fascination with politics permeates many of his novels, broadens the perspective of this novel beyond that of a love story by tying many of the characters' experiences to revolutionary politics, paying particular attention to Peruvian strongmen from 1960 to 1990. Drawing loose parallels between the bad girl, who represents Ricardo's constantly dashed (and always revitalized) hopes, and political candidates who promise the world and fail to deliver, he sets scenes and brings his characters to life in intense, vibrant prose. Though Vargas Llosa focuses on two people, the bad girl and the good boy, he creates a world around them that is so fully realized that their lives take on symbolic significance: the praying mantis has many parallels in life, love, and politics. Mary Whipple


very deep and incredible to act, 16 Feb 2001
what a fabulous play. It is so deep and it gives such an accurate portrayl of a woman undertaking the final stages of recovery from an incident that has scarred her for life. It is everyones wish to meet their tormenter from when they were young - this book describes the sinister triumph of a woman settling the score. I loved acting it.

A play for our age, 18 Oct 2000
Death and the Maiden is one of those plays that become instant classics. It is almost like a Greek tragedy in that it deals with so much with so little effort- torture, rape,revenge, guilt, truth. It is a play that is un-cluttered with stage directions, which, if one has a good imagination, leaves room for your mind to explore the world that Dorfman creates and allows you to imagine what the characters are doing... It only has 3 characters which really makes it interesting- Dorfman keeps the tension and the drama going for the whole play while he has only these 3 characters to write about. This play hits home hard, because whether you've been raped, tortured or not, Dorfman has created characters that have elements of us all- you'll recognise yourself in at least one aspect of one character... This is a play that asks you for answers- so it is using you as an instrument in its own "life" as an interesting aspect of theatre. One for the imaginative.

I can't, 23 Jan 1999
I think i would have enjoyed this book. But, unfortunately, your organization does not provide a bit of text in this window and i cannot find any translated text on the net. It's probably a very good book. Just too bad I can't find it. Enjoy!! ;)

"Reality . . . Isn't Restricted by This Cell We In", 03 Jul 2008
This was Puig's fourth and best-known novel. It was published in 1976 and translated into English three years later.

Much of the book consisted of dialogue. It, and the shifting from the daily routine of the two main characters in prison to the descriptions of the films, was usually entertaining and kept my interest. The author contrasted the two personalities and their ways of thinking -- political and sensual, engaged and escapist, living for the future and living for the present, "masculine" and "feminine." He showed the two men opposed at first, but moving to accommodate each other as the book progressed. For me, this was shown especially well at the end.

The range of films described was also interesting. Obviously, one can relate the characters in the films -- with their double lives, terrible secrets, covert missions, the search for love and the need to believe in it, love overcoming betrayal and hardship -- to the two in prison.

The amount of space in the book given to films, and later on to the popular songs in the last film, was part of Puig's usual concern, how people use those forms to escape from reality but also elevate their lives, how their understanding of themselves is guided by the forms, with their "tremendous truths."

Toward the book's end, the characters either began speaking the language of the other or acting something like the other. The author also seemed to suggest that an ideal relationship, whatever the members' gender, was one where people kept no secrets from each other. All these things were enjoyable.

A few lengthy interior monologues in the novel weren't understood, and the over-long footnotes on Freud, Reich, Marcuse, Brown and others, or the description of wartime Berlin, often seemed dated and over the top. Much in them concerned the theorists' calls for a new morality and revision of the idea of human nature. Several set up the idea of "perversions" as threats to the "basic repressive principles fundamental to the organization of capitalism." And discussed the need for men to liberate the women locked in the dungeons of their psyche and restructure their views of sexual normality. These footnotes suggested that one of the men, Molina, might be a revolutionary element in his own way.

a tapestry of intrigue, 26 Oct 2007
As other reviewers have stated, this book is set in a prison cell in Argentina . The 2 characters are an unlikely pair, Molina an effeminate homosexual and Valentin a member of a guerrilla organistion. It is a tale of their growing relationship, that the enforcement of the prison cell has foisted upon them.

It is an easy book to read,and while it deals with complex issues, I never felt overwhelmed by them.

From Molina's first story about the Panther woman, who is afraid to kiss her husband, in case she murders him, the theme of love, fear and betrayel are set.

Puig has written a brilliant book, that deserves all the acclaim it has gotten. It will leave you thinking, not only about who we love, but also why we love, and I mean to include ideologies as well as people.

The sub text of Freudian's take on homosexuality is interesting too.

I would recommend to anyone who enjoys a good book, but it does have an adult theme, so be aware of that.

PUIG M., Kiss of the Spider Woman Vintage (New York) 1980 pp 281, 19 Apr 2007
Puig's masterpiece is the story of trust and betrayal that takes place in an Argentinean prison in the 1970s. The two main characters are Molina, imprisoned for homosexuality, and Valentin, a political revolutionary. To help pass time, Molina recounts the stories and memories of his favourite movies. The first of these is the classic noir 'Cat People', and further movies concerning the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France, Zombies and others. This vehicle gives Puig an opportunity to tell stories within stories. Much of the book is written as an exchange of dialogue, more like a piece of drama than a novel, and also includes footnotes that discuss the nature of homosexuality as a psychological condition.
This Freudian environment, with the addition of Puig's astonishing mixture of forms, gives the book its backdrop. Over this background Puig tells us a story of how Molina and Valentin are drawn together by circumstance and then forced apart by fate. In terms of both form and content Kiss of the Spider Woman is a breathtaking and powerful work that is destined to become a modern classic.
Translation by Thomas Colchie



Unexpected twists - amazing book, 18 Dec 2006
Thoroughly post-modern in approach and incredibly innovative, I read this cover to cover in one sitting. Excellent plot development and deliberately disconcerting polyphonic structure with genuinely surprising twists in the tale. Don't be put off by the original (and 'difficult') structure - this book is well worth perservering with.

Wonderful stuff!

An unlikely friendship, and some plot twists..., 15 Aug 2006
"Kiss of the Spider Woman" (1976) is a novel written by Manuel Puig (1932-1990), an Argentinian playwright, novelist and screenwriter. Its subject is controversial, as it delves upon themes such as sexual identity, violence and torture. All the same, I think reading it is worthwhile, as it is one of those books that tell a story that comes alive to the reader...

In case you haven't heard about "Kiss of the Spider Woman", I will tell you a little about its plot. The main characters are Valentin and Molina, two men that share a prison cell, during the Argentinian dictatorship of the late 1970's. Molina is a sensitive soul that happens to be an homosexual, and Valentin a revolutionary that despises the fact that Molina has no political ideas (and is confused by the notion that someone can choose to be gay). Due to the fact that both share the same cell, Valentin and Molina spend some time talking to each other about their ideas and feelings, something they wouldn't have done in any other circumstance. Despite their differences, an unlikely friendship will begin between them, a friendship that may well turn into something more. However, there is more than one twist that will surprise you in this story, even though I won't tell you about that in order not to spoil the surprise.

On the whole, this is an engaging book that is likely to interest the reader, but that is not adequate for children, and that won't appeal to those that don't want to read a book that deals with homosexuality. I liked the way in which Puig told Valentin and Molina's story, and that is the reason why I give it 3.5 stars...

Belen Alcat

Far too incoherent, 14 Nov 2008
This may have been a more enjoyable, rewarding book with a more straightforward narrative structure but by the time you hit page 20 suddenly everything falls apart. Each new paragraph appears to be shifting onto something completely new and it's never terribly clear who is speaking.
Some of the prose is nice but i don't think this translation is too great.
If i were to pick a page at random of this book i have only recently read, not only would i not be able to tell what was going on, i would have absolutely no recollection of having read that page.
At heart it looks like it might have been a very compelling book but i found it to be virtually unreadable and completely unsatisfying.

A man seeks his father...Pedro Paramo...., 11 Nov 2007

This novel is one of the most highly rated of the 20th c latin-american classics,Gabriel Garcia Marquez wished he had written it and this slim novel has become possibly the first of the great novels from the 1950's

Brevity is the key here,within 122 pages this novel is full of backgrounds and what ifs, as ghosts haunt the streets of Colama,where the despot Pedro Paramo cast his evil eye many years before.

The skill in Rulfo's style is where he manages to make the novel seem longer,small paragraphs follow mini-chapters where the meat of the story is laid.The dying despot sitting as his town starves is a great image, still causing distress even as he is dying.

The clipped style hints at so much more,the lives long faded and the intrigues,murders and deaths. Rulfo manages to bring southern mexico into the northern lands with the rain,the crops,the Villastas and many other small elements in this tale.


Regrettably, Reading This Felt as If Time Had Turned Backward, 13 Oct 2007
Those who like novels where it often doesn't become unclear until the third or fourth read what's happening, who's speaking, who's listening, who's doing what, how most of the characters are related to each other, and how the series of events described are related