Sunday, March 18, 2012

Perla-Carolina De Robertis

Perla


Carolina De Robertis

Knopf, Mar 27 2012, $25.95

ISBN: 9780307599599



In 2001 in the Buenos Aires area, twenty two years old college coed Perla Correa is alone house-sitting while her parents are on vacation. Perla recently ended her relationship with Gabriel the journalist when he began looking into her family history as he thinks she was one of the stolen ones.



A naked man invades her home. Although she knows she should be frightened of the intruder, Perla finds herself fascinated with him. As she ignores school and friends, over the next few days he tells her that his life ended during the “Dirty War” when he was abducted leaving behind his beloved pregnant wife. As he relates his story of horror, increasingly Perla wonders who she really is as she examines her parents during the Dirty War state sponsored terrorism as her dad was a high-ranking military officer and her mom was at his side.



Perla is a haunting tale of identity lost maybe forever; as three decades have passed since the Argentina reign of terror, but the aftermath of the horrors still impacts the country. Character driven by the title character who needs to know the truth and the living “ghost” who knows his truth, readers will appreciate this heart-wrenching tale.



Harriet Klausner



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