Friday, February 09, 2007

can we all just agree that isabel allende's of love and shadows is a stunning book?

please read it. it might break your heart, and it gave me terrible nightmares when i read it right before bed, but it is beautiful and it has incredible tenacious strands of hope and dignity and quiet defiance, and a gorgeous love story interwoven with a brave and unflinching depiction of the dirty wars in latin america. (which, especially if you are a north american, you should know about.)

also, it has this passage, which i want you to read:

"'Gustavo has waited for me all his life,' Irene said, 'I am going to marry him.'
'I don't believe it,' whispered Francisco.
She clasped Francisco's dark head in her hands and looked into his eyes. They smiled, comforted, joyful, trembling, certain that they would never settle for a brief adventure, because they were born to share life in its totality and to undertake the audacity of loving each other forever."

amen.

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