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A review by uosdwisrdewoh
La Perdida by Jessica Abel
3.0
Jessica Abel skillfully tells the somewhat frustrating story of Carla, an American ex-pat in Mexico City who slowly gets trapped by that city's darker side.
I enjoy a book with flawed, realistic characters, but this one takes that almost too far. We watch Carla make one bad decision after another, and alienating one friend after another, and willfully refusing to see the mounting evidence in front of her face that her life is going off the edge, all in an close-minded attempt to be more authentically Mexican. At the end, she wonders at what point she could have changed things. Maybe at the several points when her former friends told her that her new friends (who she saw as authentic Mexicans) were actually lowlifes, but she didn't believe them?
In a way, Carla reminds me of those people everyone knows. She means well and can be too stubborn for her own good. She's recognizably human, but she's still a recognizably frustrating human to spend time with.
A lot of the problems of the plot are alleviated by Jessica Abel's fantastic visual storytelling abilities. Abel gets Mexico City just right, from the gardens of Xochimilco to the Torre Latinoamericano. Never does anything ring false. If only the characters that walk through this city were a bit more enjoyable to read about.
I enjoy a book with flawed, realistic characters, but this one takes that almost too far. We watch Carla make one bad decision after another, and alienating one friend after another, and willfully refusing to see the mounting evidence in front of her face that her life is going off the edge, all in an close-minded attempt to be more authentically Mexican. At the end, she wonders at what point she could have changed things. Maybe at the several points when her former friends told her that her new friends (who she saw as authentic Mexicans) were actually lowlifes, but she didn't believe them?
In a way, Carla reminds me of those people everyone knows. She means well and can be too stubborn for her own good. She's recognizably human, but she's still a recognizably frustrating human to spend time with.
A lot of the problems of the plot are alleviated by Jessica Abel's fantastic visual storytelling abilities. Abel gets Mexico City just right, from the gardens of Xochimilco to the Torre Latinoamericano. Never does anything ring false. If only the characters that walk through this city were a bit more enjoyable to read about.