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There‘s so much in this book that I want to quote. Maybe the reason is that I, too, am someone who thinks about the relationship between self and story. Maybe I‘m looking for a new way to understand the world and the self and the boundary between them, or lack thereof. “Everything survives,” Rojas Contreras writes, and it‘s both a comfort and a warning. I‘m gonna be thinking about this one for a while.

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#readingtheamericas2023 #colombia This memoir recounts the author‘s traumatic childhood in Colombia. It captures a totally non western perspective on her family‘s interactions with ghosts, water spirits, and being able to foresee the future. Coming from a long line of healers, our magical realism is simply realism to this author. All people and places have their stories and this is a unique and powerful perspective on their ability to heal.

This memoir, written by a woman who shares a history of amnesia with her mother (who is basically her twin), & a history of violence, racism, trauma, & magic with her family from Colombia (where she spent the first part of her life before being forced to flee), is everything the reviews say: “dazzling”, “passionate”, “kaleidoscopic”, & philosophical. It‘s also sadly lacking in warmth. It seems narcissism (a trauma response?) runs in her family.

“We have a word in Spanish for the walking of the dead — desandar. To un-walk.”

Unlike any other memoir I‘ve read! Contreras writes about her supernaturally gifted family members in Columbia with a keen eye and deep admiration. Towards the end of the book, she wraps it up perfectly to describe the world she‘s coming from, (and I‘m paraphrasing): Contreras was told she writes fictional “magical realism” in writing programs. To her, however, she‘s writing actual accounts of the many strange happenings within her family.

I‘m not sure I have the words to describe the hangover I have from this book. In this memoir the author shares her family‘s lineage of healers & seers. Her grandfather, a healer of curses and remover of ghosts; she and her mother share an experience of amnesia that changes both of their lives, the trauma of living in a never ending war zone. The writing was hypnotic and moving. Sentences stopped me, giving me the time to feel into them. 🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩

Captain Adorable, my grandson, was walking home from school. I had just read this line, thought it was brilliant, asked him to sit a minute so we could talk about it: “I know that the meat of the body imagines itself to be air.” He just thought it was funny. I explained that in my world it feels as if the heart & mind are all this body is. The rest definitely feels like a tagalong, like air. Again, that smile. “You‘re goofy, G.” Off he went.

The title refers to the author's grandfather who was a curandero, a type of healer in the Colombian mountainside town where he lived. This memoir details that family history and the incredible tales of her grandfather's and mother's apparent supernatural abilities and their connection to Colombian culture. Those stories seap into present-day and affect the author's life in surprising ways. I'm confident this one will stay with me for a long time.

Beautiful lyrical memoir. Highly recommended.

#12Booksof2022 @Andrew65

This is an interesting memoir that in places doesn‘t seem to have much of a point, but comes together as a fascinating portrait of a family. Rojas Contreras comes from a long line of curanderos in Columbia, those who heal or help through magic. This is completely outside my own belief system, so it was interesting to delve into something so different. And the writing is terrific.

I wanted to love this book coming from a Colombian American upbringing. At times I was mesmerized by her writing but other times the memoir felt slow and hard to believe. Yet, I am grateful Rojas shared her story and that of her family to the world.
“The person who escapes. The mind that forgets itself. The culture that is thought to be erased. The answer is everything. Everything survives”