Seven novels that bear witness to Latin America’s Dirty Wars

Jahia de Rose is an antillana-deutsch artist, landworker, writer, and scholar. Her bylines appear in Electric Literature, midnight + indigo (forthcoming), PetitMort, Business Insider, and several indie publications. She is at work on a novel and her first memoir. She blogs on Substack as @autumnwildroses, and her Substack publication ‘Roadworthy’ chronicles her off-grid life on the road in Europe.

At Electric Lit the writer tagged seven "works of historical fiction about events in [Latin America and the Caribbean] which touch on the Dirty Wars." One title on the list:

The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende

Isabel Allende, cousin of the overthrown, democratically elected Chilean president, Salvador Allende, is the author of the surrealist, at times humorous, often sorrowful epic that is The House of the Spirits. This novel tells the socio-political story of Chile in the early and mid-20th century by following three generations of the Trueba family and their lovers, associates, and enemies. All the book’s events radiate out from the central foci of husband and wife, Esteban and Clara Trueba. Clara, around whom the novel’s events begin, speaks to spirits, predicts the future, and levitates objects. Esteban, symbolic of the conservative influences behind Chile’s anti-socialist opposition of the time period, imagines himself to be a man of traditional values and good character, yet he exploits, cheats, and beats his way through life. The book is a noteworthy reflection upon the ways in which conservative politicians are often revealed to be hypocritical of their espoused values.

Read about another novel on the list.

The House of the Spirits is among Vanessa Saunders's seven speculative feminism books written by women, Lois Parkinson Zamora's five top books to capture the magic of magical realism, Christopher Barzak's five books about magical families, and Elif Shafak's five favorite literary mothers.

--Marshal Zeringue