Welcome to Litsy!

#ReadTheWorld2025

Hi @GatheringBooks here‘s my first update on your challenge. In January and February I read 6 books set in countries and/or written by authors from all over the world. These countries are #Mexico, #Japan, #SouthKorea, #Netherlands, #FrenchPolynesia and #Chile. I hope to read at least six more in March and April!

Other Littens are loving this #TOBlonglist book, but it just isn‘t working for me. I don‘t like the writing. And even after setting it aside for a week and picking it back up, still no go.

There‘s a drive when you write on paper, a sound to the pencil. A strange equilibrium between elbow, hand, and pencil.

Our book selections for mid-Feb to March! Join us in reading these two novellas by Latin American authors.

#bookofthemonth

A short Chilean novel about societal treatment of outsiders or people who choose to live outside the norms.

It‘s a quick read. From the point of view of 12 year old Miguel whose uncle Ramon decided to leave their neighborhood and live in a billboard alone. Ramon has always valued silence, and finds more of it in his isolation.

Definitely has a melancholy cast, but interesting philosophical ideas.

Gabriel is a 16 year old American living in Chile. He has his two best friends, a new girlfriend, and no desire to ever leave Chile and return to the US. Then there is a coup… Told from three different perspectives (although I found each of them less compelling than the first) this was a really great read that managed to combine coming of age with political turmoil an engaging and moving way. Why was this not on the TOB shortlist?

Yes this is an excellent book. 16 years old Gabriel grows up in Chile with his American parents. He is ashamed of his capitalist parents and his imperialist motherland, infiltrating the world with propaganda. He is a Chilean communist and a supporter of Allende‘s socialist politics. He falls in love in the days leading up to the coup against Allende in 1973.
In 3 parts we read about this period in time and its aftermath. And about Gabriel‘s life.

A novella about a woman who goes along with her partner‘s desire to have a child even though she doesn‘t want to be a mother. Her intentions are good but of course everything changes in their lives. Powerful emotions run throughout these pages, from isolation to desire and back again. An undeniably strong story that I liked but didn‘t quite love.

5+⭐️ I always worry about overselling a book here, but this #toblonglist choice is one of the best books I‘ve ever read. Ten years of PhD research about Allende‘s and Pinochet‘s regimes in Chile culminated in a novel that perfectly captures the fates of an American boy and his Chilean girlfriend when the coup happens. The story is told in sections with three MCs that each illuminate different faces of survivors and their families. Just read it!