Tyranny and Butterflies

In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez
Chapel Hill, N.C. : Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 1994.
325 p. ; 23 cm.

I'm not sure why I decided to read this book now, but I'm glad I did.  I think I was feeling a little unenthusiastic about the lightness of some of the YA fantasy books and wanted something with more substance.  I also had not read Alvarez yet and wanted to, so it seemed like a good a time as any. 

In the Time of Butterflies is the fictionalized account of four Dominican sisters - three of whom (along with their driver) were murdered by Trujillo, the horrid dictator of the Dominican Republic.  The novel is a beautiful retelling of the lives of the sisters and their families and how they became involved in revolutionary politics. For a novel that involves imprisonment, beatings, and political assassinations - it is really a tender and beautiful book. Alvarez seems determined to demythologize the heroics of the characters and instead show how human, humane and complicated it is for people to get involved in clandestine, violent political work.  Of course one can't read Alvarez' book and not think of a later novel set in the Trujillo dictatorship, Junot Diaz' 2007 masterpiece - The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. Both are fantastic books, and offer unique angles on life under dictatorship ( and immigration in the case of Diaz).  I would recommend them both.

If read over a long period, the novel can get a little confusing (which sister is which and is married to who and what year is it?) but still manages to be engaging and moving.  I found reading the last chapter of the book to be a very emotional experience. Alvarez manages to not only tell the story of repression, revolution, and family, but she makes you, the reader, feel like it is your story, your family - and that the loss is your loss, too.

A Wondrous Read

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

by Junot Diaz
New York : Riverhead Books, 2007.
1st U.S. ed.
340 p. ; 22 cm.

No wonder Wondrous won the Pulitzer Prize for 2008. It is a stunning read - full of passion, humor, history, wit, and anger (and an unforgettable protagonist, the overweight and unlucky in love Oscar). Reading this book, most Americans will realize how little they know of the Caribbean Stalin aka Trujillo, who merits some unsavory nicknames from the author, the nicest of which is the Cattle Thief. Unfortunately, Trujillo ruled with help from Uncle Sam, and when overthrown, popular rule was again thwarted by US Marines sent in by LBJ. The joy of this novel is all in the telling though - the history is woven in with such scathing humor and deadpan craziness that it only really sinks in after you have put the book down.

And what about the high school audience? Well, the book was written for adults, though Booklist recommended it for mature YA readers, which makes sense with the teen/college-aged protagonist. It's definitely not a book one could assign since it has mature sexual scenes and rather salty language. It's also rough with political violence, but for any student who wants to get a grip on the history of the Dominican Republic through an inspired coming of age/immigration novel - this is it.