The Fat Man from La Paz: Contemporary Fiction from Bolivia by Rosario Santos


The Fat Man from La Paz: Contemporary Fiction from Bolivia
Title : The Fat Man from La Paz: Contemporary Fiction from Bolivia
Author :
Rating :
ISBN : 1583220321
ISBN-10 : 9781583220320
Language : English
Format Type : Paperback
Number of Pages : 320
Publication : First published July 1, 2000

The twenty stories collected in this volume offer not only a comprehensive look at the variety and invention of Bolivian literature, but also provide more information about the heart and soul of Bolivia than a warehouse full of news reports. The most comprehensive collection of modern Bolivian literature yet published in English, The Fat Man from La Paz offers a kaleidoscopic view of the country's last fifty years, from a sociological and cultural viewpoint.
The Fat Man from La Paz places such Bolivian luminaries as Augusto Cespedes, whose The Well is probably the most published piece of Bolivian literature, alongside bright young stars like Edmundo Paz Soldan, one of last year's finalists for the Romulo Gallegos Literary Prize (the Nobel prize for Latin American writers). In the title story, Gonzalo Lema's "The Fat Man from La Paz," a Bolivian detective, with a nod to Raymond Chandler's Philip Marlowe, takes a hard look at corruption in Bolivia's capital city and learns a thing or two about the dark ambiguities lurking in human nature and in the communities people build. Many of the other stories in The Fat Man from La Paz appear here for the first time in English.

The Fat Man from La Paz: Contemporary Fiction from Bolivia Reviews

  • Jim

    Edited by
    Rosario Santos,
    The Fat Man from La Paz: Contemporary Fiction from Bolivia contains twenty stories that run the gamut from mediocre to excellent, especially Augusto Cespedes' "The Well," about an incident from the grim Chaco War of the 1930s.

    In some of the stories, there are hints of magical realism. In others, such as Ricardo Ocampo's "Paulino the Indian," the grimness of how the native population is mistreated takes center stage.

    The collection is a very mixed bag, but as I am interested some day in visiting Bolivia, I felt the book succeeded in giving me an idea of how twenty writers see life in their country.

  • Susan

    The only book I could find of Bolivian fiction. As another reader said, hard to rate as some stories are terrific- and I wish there were more by that author. And some not so good. But good to read before a trip to Bolivia and gave me some information on Bolivian history.

  • Veronika S

    I loved the idea of this book (as I absolutely fell in love with Bolivia and this was the only example of Bolivian literature in English I managed to find). However I simply got bored about half way through the book.

  • Molly

    Great collection of stories from all kinds of authors, styles, etc. You will like some and loathe some, but overall a great variety.

  • Tanja (Litteraturhesten)

    Bolivia