Latin American Voices: Magic Realism

This book acts as somewhat of an encyclopedia of diverse beings drawn from numerous sources.

This novel employs magical realism to tell the story “of the rise and fall, birth and death of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendía family.”

This book is considered a milestone in Latin American literature, in which Fuentes explores the soul of modern Mexico. Written in 1962, the book is set across the late 19th and 20th century, acting as a portrait of the fictional character Artemio Cruz. The book, which has been translated into English, is a commentary on capitalism, and the quest for wealth while touching on themes of power and opportunism.

A short novel, which explores magical realism and themes of identity. The book, which is written in second person narrative, follows a young historian named Felipe Montero. This copy of the book remains untranslated, but if you would like to read it in English translation, please see one of the library student workers to help you.

Juan Preciado travels to his mother’s hometown to meet his father, only to find it to be a ghost town, inhabited by un-living beings. Ruflo explores themes of magical realism within this inspirational piece.

Esquivel uses magical realism to tell the story of Tita, a young woman yearning for Pedro, her beloved, but cannot be with him due to the tradition of the youngest daughter renouncing marriage to care for her mother. This novel explores themes of passion, rebellion, and gender.

“The actual physical borderland that I'm dealing with in this book is the Texas-U.S Southwest/Mexican border. The psychological borderlands, the sexual borderlands and the spiritual borderlands are not particular to the Southwest. In fact, the Borderlands are physically present wherever two or more cultures edge each other, where people of different races occupy the same territory, where under, lower, middle and upper classes touch, where the space between two individuals shrinks with intimacy. I am a border woman.” - Gloria Anzaldúa

Within this magical realism novel Allende explores the tragedies of the Trueba family. The matriarch of the family has a powerful connection to the spirit world, the daughter Blanca defies her hot tempered father and has a forbidden love affair, resulting in a daughter Alba, who will lead her country into a revolutionary future.

Maya was raised by her grandparents Nini and Popo, who were immigrants from Chile. After Popo’s death, Maya begins her downward spiral of substance use and petty crime and is thrown into a dangerous underworld of gang assassins. She finds salvation in Nini who helps her escape to a remote island off the coast of Chile. If you are interested in reading this in English please see a student worker.

This book follows Oscar Wao who is struggling against an ancient curse that has haunted his family for generations. Deciding to be the last victim of the curse, Oscar denounces the curse and risks it all in the name of love.

This novel is a collection of poems which tell the story of Xiomara Batista. Xiomara struggles to exist in her Harlem neighborhood once her body begins to develop. She finds refuge from her neighborhood and her overbearing religious mother by joining her school’s slam poetry club, where she begins to find her voice.

This novel follows Yo, short for Yolanda, who is a young Dominican author. Her family arrived in the United States seeking refuge from a dictator. She is still searching for her identity even after being twice divorced.

This novel follows the three Mirabal sisters, better known as Las Mariposas (the butterflies), and their fourth sister who outlived them. Las Mariposas were unfortunately murdered because they rebelled against Trujillo’s dictatorship. Their young martyred lives continue to touch the lives of many Hispanic Caribbean individuals, and serve as examples of both resilience and rebellion. We also carry an English version of the book “In the Time of the Butterflies”.

The English translation of "En el Tiempo de las Mariposas".

This novel explores four sisters who were forced to flee from the Dominican Republic due to Trujillo’s dictatorship and resettle in New York City. The short stories which constitute the novel explore themes of assimilation, feelings of displacement, fear, and the idea of a fragmented self. If you would like to obtain an English version of the book please see one of the library workers.