4.5*

I knew nothing of this book going in. I knew it was based on Shakespeare's Tristan and Isolde in a more modern setting with the black man from the favelas in Rio falling in love with an upper class white girl. I wasn't familiar with the story of Tristan and Isolde so just kind of blindly leaped in.

Even if you're not familiar with the Shakespeare story, skimming through the chapter titles can give you a pretty good idea of the plot. However, this book becomes so much more than the plot. It's a discussion on sex, first and foremost, growing up, adventure, finding oneself, finding love, the complexities of love etc.


I'd heard of John Updike and knew of his Run, Rabbit series as being critically acclaimed despite never having read them, so this was my first work of his. This novel in particular reminded me of 3 authors rolled into one: James Michener, John Steinbeck and Mario Vargas Llosa. Michener for taking you on a journey through Brazil from Rio to Sao Paulo, to the makeshift capital in the middle of nowhere Brasilia, to the planalto, the Brazilian outback, the selva, the middle of nowhere, through Indian tribes and backlands. Steinbeck for it's poetic description of desperate times and poverty and people desperate to find a means to live from the land. Vargas Llosa for it's ability to be violent, perverse, invoking spirits and the rituals, culture and means of survival from ancient native tribes who live according to their own rules with no outside regulation.

This story beautifully develops the characters and does a great job of putting you in the setting which becomes so much more than the plot itself. This line in particular is something that could have come out of The Grapes of Wrath or Travels With Charley and describing the depressed Midwest of early 20th century America, yet it's describing the planalto of 1970s Brazil:

"There is a melancholy, a stupidity to rural landscape that numbed the citified hearts of the young couple--a yawning repetitiveness, as of a man who knows only a few words but yet will not stop talking."

I love books that take me on a journey, particularly ones that are set in countries outside of my own that I have lived in or am familiar with. This book took me on that journey and for that it gives me 4.5*. It was uncomfortable and graphic at times, and in the end the journey was well worth it. In 250 pages. Weirdly I'm not sure it's made me want to read more Updike, which would normally be a snap call for an author who wrote a book I rated so highly, but I was very pleased with having read this one.