I can see why this won a pulitzer. I loved the language, and the writing style (yes, there is lots of swearing):
I guess I should have fucking known. Dude used to say he was cursed, used to say this a lot, and if I'd really been old-school Dominican I would have (a) listened to the idiot, and then (b) run the other way. My family are surenos from Azua, and if we surenos from Azua know anything it's about fucking curses.
The passionate style at times reminded me a little of stand-up comedy in terms of delivery. I think this would make a fantastic audio book. The untranslated Spanish was occasionally annoying, but mostly I found those sentences interesting. The other languages in the book belong to sci-fi/fantasy geeks, and although I got most of the references, I missed plenty too (been too long since I read Dune):
Even a woman as potent as La Inca, who with the elvish ring of her will had forged within Bani her own personal Lothlorien, knew that she could not protect the girl against a direct assault from the Eye.
Oscar is a great character, similar in many ways to Ignatius J. Reilly, but I would have liked to know him better. I felt limited by the narrator's view of him.
The insight into the brutality of Trujillo in the Dominican Republic was fascinating, and although lots of information was delivered in footnotes, they weren't boring footnotes.
I felt a little off-balance by the perspective changes and plot jumps, and that wasn't helped by reading the book in smaller chunks than usual.
3.5 stars.
No comments:
Post a Comment