Volume 49, Number 4 · March 14, 2002
Girls with Green Hair
By Michael Wood
Portrait in Sepia
by Isabel Allende,translated from the Spanish by Margaret Sayers Peden
HarperCollins, 304 pp., $26.00
Leaving Tabasco
by Carmen Boullosa, translated from the Spanish by Geoff Hargreaves
Grove, 244 pp., $24.00
Nocturnal Butterflies of the Russian Empire
by José Manuel Prieto,translated from the Spanish by Carol and Thomas Christensen
Grove, 336 pp., $13.00 (paper)
Our Lady of the Assassins
by Fernando Vallejo, translated from the Spanish by Paul Hammond
Serpent's Tail, 135 pp., $13.99 (paper)
When we read of a 'colossal grandmother' and a little girl with green hair, we probably think we know where we are. When we further encounter the abundant flora of southern Chile, an orphan, a rambling mansion, a handful of wise Indian women, and an irresistible tropical passion, we can hardly doubt our location. This is the world of magical realism, where reality is all profusion, and fantasy is just another name for local color.
Review, 4668 words
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