This novel follows a Spanish family through the decades from
the late 1930s through the early 1990s as they flee to France
during the Spanish Civil War, travel to Chile as refugees, work hard to re-assemble
their lives, and do their best to survive in the Chilean political unrest.
While I learned a lot about Spanish and Chilean history
and I liked getting to know the main characters, this novel never
swept me up. It was often too factual like a textbook. The struggles in which
this family found itself all felt genuine but it felt like the political
climate was the protagonist more than the characters. And, speaking of a political climate full of
unrest and division, much of it was so resonant with opinions and issues in
which the US finds itself today. It was
depressing. People never learn, do
they? Heck, there was even a toilet
paper shortage in Chile during the regime changes! Who knew?
In the end, it was a novel about hope and survival. This
book was also a love letter to Isabel Allende’s home country of Chile. I enjoyed learning about poet Pablo Neruda.
In fact, the title of the novel is inspired by one of his poems about Chile.
Sadly, I feel this audiobook took away from my enjoyment of
the novel. And it was even doubly
upsetting since I ADORED the way Edoardo Ballerini read Beautiful Ruins and,
therefore, had high expectations. But, I didn’t appreciate the voices he gave
most of the characters (which weren’t very differentiated nor were the male
voices very masculine, surprisingly) and I felt that he did nothing to improve
the textbook sections of the novel but, rather, sped through them so quickly
like it was a chore for even him to read them.
He did a good job with the character voice acting but let me down in the other
areas. I’ll give him a B for this novel.
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