Adrián Ormache, a high-flying lawyer with a beautiful wife and two daughters, leads a privileged and glamorous life in one of Lima’s wealthiest neighborhoods. But when his mother dies, he discovers a letter amongst her possessions making shocking claims about her now long-dead husband, Adrián’s father—a commander in the army during the Peruvian Civil War of the 1980s. As well as being linked to atrocities committed against the ‘Shining Path’ guerrillas, it appears that he also kidnapped and kept a local girl, whose family now seeks retribution.

Shocked out of his comfortable existence, Adrián becomes obsessed with finding the girl and sets out to face the harrowing realities of Peru’s recent past, and uncover the truth about his father.

“The strength of the plot pivots on the lovers’ ambiguous feelings for one another—the intensity of their mismatched love and hatred is perfectly drawn.” —Times Literary Supplement

(Group read suggestion from Mia DeGiovine Chaveco, book club co-founder.)

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