Vargas Llosa, Mario

"Guatemala, 1954. The military coup perpetrated by Carlos Castillo Armas and sponsored by the United States through the CIA overthrows the government of Jacobo ?rbenz"--Provided by publisher.

Latin American novelist Mario Vargas Llosa offers his analysis of Victor Hugo's "Les Miserables," arguing that the novel presents a utopian vision of literature that prompts readers to imagine a better world.

Forty-nine-year-old Urania Cabral, haunted all her life by terror and emptiness, returns to her homeland, the Dominican Republic, and finds herself reliving the bloody revolution of 1961, when brutal dictator Rafael "The Goat" Trujillo--under whom Urania's father served as secretary of state--was overthrown.

A fictionalized account of the life and career of Roger Casement, who fought for human rights of oppressed people in the Belgian Congo and the Amazon, but who was ultimately hanged by the British government in 1916 for treason, because he dared to draw a parallel between the injustices he witnessed in the African and American colonies and those committed by the British in Northern Ireland.

Mario's romance with and marriage to his divorced Aunt Julia provides the main plot, while his friend, soap opera scriptwriter Pedro Camacho, provides the counterpoint of this comedic tale of Lima in the 50s.

After sexy older Aunt Julia gets divorced in Bolivia, she returns to Peru and begins a relationship with her eighteen-year-old nephew Varguitas, and when they marry the family is shocked and declares that Julia must leave the country.

Mario's romance with and marriage to his divorced Aunt Julia provides the main plot, while his friend, soap opera scriptwriter Pedro Camacho, provides the counterpoint of this comedic tale of Lima in the 50s.

Ricardo Somocurcio is haunted by his love affair with the mysterious Comrade Arlette, whom Ricardo is certain is the same woman he knew as Lily in his teenage years, and as the years pass, and her guise changes, Ricardo wonders why he is so drawn to this woman and what influence she has on his life.