A Santo in the Image of Cristobal Garcia

i liked this novel as it is in the same family as marquez and allende. it's beautifully written and casts a lovely slow dark shadow, if you are in this sort of mood. i love the inherent sadness but warmth between and for the characters. with aging parents, it seems revealing how older people review in a non-sequential matter, their relationships, choices, things that they thought mattered with didn't and other subjects. the ghostly spector of good and evil permeates many sections, and implies that human relations carry weighty and far-reaching consequences. while bad behaviour is a given within this community, by individuals who are family members and/or neighbors, going too far is tied up within the notions of greed, magic, forces beyond one's control, and to an extent, race. essentially, i really loved the spell this novel cast and am looking forward to reading the others in the trilogy.