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The narrators of Paco Ignacio Taibo II's wonderfully inventive novel, Four Hands, are Greg Simon and Julio investigative journalists uncovering an elaborate plot by an obscure American government agency to vilify the Sandinista leadership in Nicaragua. The story they discover and type out together weaves truth with lies, wild humor with tragedy, and reality with fantasy–a stranger-than-fiction tale of imperial excess where delusion makes perfect sense.Joining such historical figures as Harry Houdini, Leon Trotsky, Pancho Villa, and Stan Laurel is a sprawling cast of characters that includes Alex, a spymaster with a knack for the absurd; Rolando, a depraved Mexican drug trafficker; and Stoyan Vasilev, a geriatric Bulgarian counterspy.A “documentary novel” and a passionate satire about the means and ends of politics, Paco Taibo's Four Hands has been compared to the fiction of Marquéz, Dos Passos, Doctorow, and Heller.“I am his number one fan…. I can always lose myself in one of his novels because of the intelligence and humor.”—Laura Esquivel, author of Like Water for Chocolate“Taibo writes with genuine savvy, a crackling wit and a certain zaniness that is his very own…. A storyteller of real genius.”—Los Angeles Times“Like Bach (or Houdini), the pleasure Taibo offers us consists in watching him set himself a problem of astonishing complexity and then solve it.”—New York Newsday“It’s impossible to review [Taibo II’s] literary work without painting an ideological portrait. He’s probably the writer on the left with the proudest lineage of all those I’ve read.”—Christopher Domínguez Michael, Letras Libres“Taibo's prose is rich in metaphor, and his confident, insightful storytelling makes the individual pieces of his novel intriguing long before the connections among them are apparent. Dail's translation does fine justice to the author's colorful, virtuosic narrative.”—Publishers WeeklyAbout the Paco Ignacio Taibo II, or PIT, was born in Gijón, Spain in 1949, before fleeing Franco’s dictatorship with his family in 1958. He has resided in Mexico City ever since, where he’s built a career as a writer, journalist, historian, and perhaps most crucially, a founder of the neopolicial genre in Latin America. His books have been published in 29 countries and translated into nearly as many languages. In addition to being a prolific writer, he is an active member of the international crime writing community and organizes Semana Negra or “Noir Week” in his native Gijón. He has won the Latin American Dashiell Hammett Prize three times, as well as the Mexican Premio Planeta, and several other awards for international crime fiction.About the Laura C. Dail graduated from Duke University and received her Master’s degree in Spanish from Middlebury College. She has served on the board of the Association of Authors Representatives (AAR) and currently chairs the AAR Royalties Committee. A literary agent as well as a translator, she is the head of the Laura Dail Literary Agency.
659 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1990
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July 11, 2021
Σε αυτό το μυθιστόρημα ο Taibo, μέσα από μικρές, αλληλένδετες και ευρηματικές αφηγήσεις φανταστικών και πραγματικών προσώπων, καυτηριάζει την ιμπεριαλιστική εξωτερική πολιτική των Η.Π.Α την εποχή των '80ς, χωρίς να του ξεφύγει κανείς και τίποτα. Και πάνω απ' όλα το κάνει με μοναδικό στυλ.
Στο προσκήνιο το Μεξικό των Ζαπατίστας, η Κούβα του Φιντέλ, η Νικαράγουα των Σαντινίστας. Πρωταγωνιστές, μάλλον είναι δύο μαχόμενοι δημοσιογράφοι που έχουν την επιθυμία να γράψουν ένα μυθιστόρημα μαζί, με "τέσσερα χέρια", ενώ ένας επικεφαλής μυστικός πράκτορας που έλκεται απ' το παράδοξο και κατασκευάζει ψευδείς ειδήσεις έχει ως στόχο την Νικαράγουα και τους Σαντινίστας. Επιπλέον εμφανίζονται και συνυπάρχουν: ο μάγος Χουντίνι, ένα προσχέδιο αστυνομικού μυθιστορήματος του Τρότσκι, ο Πάντσο Βίγια, ένας Βούλγαρος παλιός επαναστάτης και ένας Ισπανός αναρχικός κορυφαίος στην πλαστογραφία, ο ηθοποιός Σταν Λόρελ (ο λιγνός) όπου και συνθέτουν αυτό το εκρηκτικό μείγμα πολιτικού θρίλερ και σάτιρας, με άριστα δεμένη συνοχή, όσο παράδοξο και αν ακούγεται.
Από τα καλύτερα βιβλία του Taibo ΙΙ, αν όχι το καλύτερο του, που δυστυχώς δεν επανατυπώθηκε όπως άλλοι τίτλοι του. Το αφιερώνει ολόκληρο στον Ντανιέλ Τσαβαρία.
Στο προσκήνιο το Μεξικό των Ζαπατίστας, η Κούβα του Φιντέλ, η Νικαράγουα των Σαντινίστας. Πρωταγωνιστές, μάλλον είναι δύο μαχόμενοι δημοσιογράφοι που έχουν την επιθυμία να γράψουν ένα μυθιστόρημα μαζί, με "τέσσερα χέρια", ενώ ένας επικεφαλής μυστικός πράκτορας που έλκεται απ' το παράδοξο και κατασκευάζει ψευδείς ειδήσεις έχει ως στόχο την Νικαράγουα και τους Σαντινίστας. Επιπλέον εμφανίζονται και συνυπάρχουν: ο μάγος Χουντίνι, ένα προσχέδιο αστυνομικού μυθιστορήματος του Τρότσκι, ο Πάντσο Βίγια, ένας Βούλγαρος παλιός επαναστάτης και ένας Ισπανός αναρχικός κορυφαίος στην πλαστογραφία, ο ηθοποιός Σταν Λόρελ (ο λιγνός) όπου και συνθέτουν αυτό το εκρηκτικό μείγμα πολιτικού θρίλερ και σάτιρας, με άριστα δεμένη συνοχή, όσο παράδοξο και αν ακούγεται.
Από τα καλύτερα βιβλία του Taibo ΙΙ, αν όχι το καλύτερο του, που δυστυχώς δεν επανατυπώθηκε όπως άλλοι τίτλοι του. Το αφιερώνει ολόκληρο στον Ντανιέλ Τσαβαρία.
July 16, 2017
In spite of the deceptive complexity, the plot of Paco Ignacio Taibo II's Four Hands is actually very simple. It is the colorful yet believable characters and the playful and witty telling that makes the novel very engaging.
The story is simply about how the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) tried to frame a Sandinista Minister who had a significant role in the struggle against dictator Somoza, spread disinformation, and demoralize the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. This occurs in the background of a brutal US-sponsored Contra War to topple the Sandinistas. But the contours of this narrative can only be realized near the novel’s end, when all the seemingly disparate mini-narratives coalesce.
We are first introduced to the personal narrations of the protagonists, the journalists Julio and Greg, one Mexican and the other American, who have a good time backstabbing each other in their minds and giving sardonic comments about everything.
One of my favorite characters include the American engineer who volunteered to do social work in the Nicaraguan countryside but was executed by Contra paramilitaries armed by the U.S.
Another is the CIA operative Alex who is some sort of sick conjurer whose main role, among others, is to sow disinformation and discord among opponents of US imperialist interests. He operates clandestinely through corporate fronts, flies all over the World in a jet, is well versed in high and popular culture, fights bureaucratic turf wars with his colleagues, and is a torturer and crazy to boot.
Leon Trotsky, whose notes for his own novel are provided to us for a peek, also makes a special appearance. Trotsky outlines the main plot, invents his main characters, comments on his own writing, and in the end decides to discard his novel.
Then there are the rejected Master’s thesis proposals of Elena Jordan, Greg’s ex-wife which are both ingenious and hilarious.
And finally, the long but curious story of the Bulgarian Vasilev, aging revolutionary internationalist extraordinaire who survived the Bulgarian struggle, hobnobbed with Stalin, spent some time in the Gulag, became a firm supporter of Castro, and was involved in the Sandinista final offensive against the Nicaraguan dictator Somoza.
Much of socially-oriented literature, both in prose and in poetry, that is considered to be sympathetic or directly supportive of revolutionary causes are perceived mostly as serious, grim and determined works with no place for black humor and playfulness. What Taibo II manages to create in Four Hands is a narrative that critiques the dominant social order while remaining entertaining all throughout.
From Taibo’s Four Hands
The story is simply about how the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) tried to frame a Sandinista Minister who had a significant role in the struggle against dictator Somoza, spread disinformation, and demoralize the Sandinista government in Nicaragua. This occurs in the background of a brutal US-sponsored Contra War to topple the Sandinistas. But the contours of this narrative can only be realized near the novel’s end, when all the seemingly disparate mini-narratives coalesce.
We are first introduced to the personal narrations of the protagonists, the journalists Julio and Greg, one Mexican and the other American, who have a good time backstabbing each other in their minds and giving sardonic comments about everything.
One of my favorite characters include the American engineer who volunteered to do social work in the Nicaraguan countryside but was executed by Contra paramilitaries armed by the U.S.
Another is the CIA operative Alex who is some sort of sick conjurer whose main role, among others, is to sow disinformation and discord among opponents of US imperialist interests. He operates clandestinely through corporate fronts, flies all over the World in a jet, is well versed in high and popular culture, fights bureaucratic turf wars with his colleagues, and is a torturer and crazy to boot.
Leon Trotsky, whose notes for his own novel are provided to us for a peek, also makes a special appearance. Trotsky outlines the main plot, invents his main characters, comments on his own writing, and in the end decides to discard his novel.
Then there are the rejected Master’s thesis proposals of Elena Jordan, Greg’s ex-wife which are both ingenious and hilarious.
And finally, the long but curious story of the Bulgarian Vasilev, aging revolutionary internationalist extraordinaire who survived the Bulgarian struggle, hobnobbed with Stalin, spent some time in the Gulag, became a firm supporter of Castro, and was involved in the Sandinista final offensive against the Nicaraguan dictator Somoza.
Much of socially-oriented literature, both in prose and in poetry, that is considered to be sympathetic or directly supportive of revolutionary causes are perceived mostly as serious, grim and determined works with no place for black humor and playfulness. What Taibo II manages to create in Four Hands is a narrative that critiques the dominant social order while remaining entertaining all throughout.
From Taibo’s Four Hands
September 20, 2019
review of
Paco Ignacio Taibo II's Four Hands
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - September 15-19, 2019
FULL REVIEW: https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/...
I haven't gotten tired of praising Taibo yet. Reading his work is almost like reading the work of Philip K. Dick when I 1st started reading his work in 1984 & ended up reading almost a bk by him per wk for the entire yr — in other words, the Taibos are engrossing. I am immediately interested & I read them quickly. This particular Taibo bk is actually 'signed' — whether the signature is authentic or not I wdn't know but it's got 'PIRII/94" written on the title page.
Ya just never know what juicy thing Taibo'll dream up next. In this case, it's Stan Laurel wtinessing the assassination of a major Mexican revolutionary.
""They killed Pancho Villa!" he screamed.
"The scream broke Stan's trance and he managed to lift the gin to his lips. He emptied the bottle. It was 8:02 in the morning, July 20, 1923." - p 6
The inter-related narratives include an American named "Alex" who runs a branch of the secret police called the "SD". Their nefarious purpose being a particularly nasty mixture of assassination & disruption & character assassination thru disinformation. Taibo depicts him as diabolically conscience-free. An E. Howard Hunt sort, perhaps. I wonder if Taibo ever read any of Hunt's crime fiction novels?
"Alex is just inches from clinical paranoid schizophrenia. If the psychiatrist continues to question this diagnosis, Alex himself doesn't have a shadow of a doubt, he's completely convinced of his absolute insanity. But as long as they'll let him, he'll keep running the SD, owner and master, omnipotent czar, ruler of strange destinies. And it doesn't bother him to play God in an office that one enters through a hat boutique, a ladies' room, a cleaning closet, a service elevator, a fire escape stairwell, a window and the boss's desk. Actually, he loves it. This is his idea of heavenly bureaucracy." - p 12
Note that the translator, Laura C. Dail, writes " ladies' ", not adding an "s" after the apostrophe for the possessive of a word ending in "s", but writes " boss's ", adding an "s" after the apostrophe for the possessive of a word ending in "s". TAKE THAT, RULE-MONGERERS!! Otherwise note that this extreme villain is referred to by his 1st name, almost as if he's a personal friend, uncomfortably practically making him family despite the extremity of his socipathic behavior.
"On the night of the fifth or sixth of February, 1926, unknown intruders entered the Pantheon in Parral, profaning the tomb of the caudillo of the Agrarian Revolution of the North, slashed off the head of the cadaver and stole it. The affair caused rivers of ink to run in the North American press, since the United States continued to feed the myth of the fierce bandit who had dared in 1916 to attack the town of Columbus, in New Mexico, accomplishing the only foreign invasion in the history of modern North America. The Los Angeles papers devoted a large space to Villa and the pursuit of him. Mexican rumors rapidly crossed the border, placing the missing head one day in the hands of the widow of a rich rancher whom Villa had assassinated, another day a circus had it and was touring Texas exhibiting the remains, then it was in the hands of a group of fugitive lunatics from a mental asylum in Chihuahua, after that it was the illicit property of an Oklahoma spinster who had been in love with the Mexican military genius and who had commissioned a band of professional thieves from San Francisco to steal it." - p 15
Now, I shd point out that I deserve a fucking medal for quoting that last passage b/c I found Pancho Vila's head flattened like a flower between the pages where that passage appears & it was a mess, I'll tell you what!!. Maybe that's why Taibo signed this copy.
"Pancho Villa’s coffin had been dug up during the night and his body mutilated. Amparan was reluctant to report the desecration to the municipal authorities because Villa’s body had been decapitated and the head was missing." - https://www.theyucatantimes.com/2018/...
But what about John Dillinger's penis?
"One of the more bizarre celebrity legends is the claim that notorious bank robber John Dillinger was not only the proud possessor of an unusually large penis, but that this portion of his anatomy was removed post-mortem and put on display at one of the Smithsonian museums in Washington, D.C. (Some versions state that the receiving institution was not the Smithsonian but the Armed Forces Medical Museum, which is on the grounds of the Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington.) That the Smithsonian denies having (or ever having had) this piece of classic Americana in their collection is part of the game, of course. (An auxiliary portion of the legend is that Smithsonian docents, upon being asked where Mr. Dillinger’s organ can be found, will not deny its presence in the collection but will fabricate an excuse as to why it is not currently on display.)
"How and when this rumor got started is unknown. No documentary evidence indicates that Dillinger was renowned for either his sexual prowess or his possession of a prodigious member during his lifetime." - https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/pen...
You know the infamous SPK video where they show a corpse's head being held in a hand that's making it perform fellatio on a corpse's erect male member? Was that Pancho Villa & John Dillinger? Does the slang term "Deadhead" have anything to do w/ this?
"And to this astonishing information, one can add some of the legendary stories transmitted by the cultured natives in the Jesuit missions who say "the invisible people," "the big men" lived crazily following some insane reasoning, and practiced free sex in their ceremonies, later returning to normalcy, and they did not have chiefs, nor did they engage in war, nor did they have Gods or permanent homes (Cabrera, 147, 190-198, 212). - p 27
Wha?! Having just plopped that down in front of you w/o context it's only fair to add:
"Lydia Cabrera (May 20, 1899 in Havana, Cuba – September 19, 1991 in Miami, Florida) was a Cuban independent ethnographer.
"Cabrera was a Cuban writer and literary activist. She was an authority on Santería and other Afro-Cuban religions. During her lifetime she published over one hundred books; little of her work is available in English. Her most important book is El Monte (Spanish: "The Wilderness"), which was the first major ethnographic study of Afro-Cuban traditions, herbalism and religion. First published in 1954, the book became a "textbook" for those who practice Lukumi (orisha religion originating from the Yoruba and neighboring ethnic groups) and Palo Monte (a central African faith) both religions reaching the Caribbean through African slaves. Her papers and research materials were donated to the Cuban Heritage Collection - the largest repository of materials on or about Cuba located outside of Cuba - forming part of the library of the University of Miami. A section in Guillermo Cabrera Infante's book Tres Tigres Tristes is written under Lydia Cabrera's name, in a comical rendition of her literary voice. She was one of the first writers to recognize and sensitively publish on the richness of Afro-Cuban culture and religion. She made valuable contributions in the areas of literature, anthropology, art, ethnomusicology, and ethnology." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydia_C...
Cool, huh?! Aren't you glad I told you about her? Don't you want to just find & read one of her bks now ASAP?! But back to Alex & the SD:
"That's why Alex's idea was interesting. In the beginning it would be enough to saturate the enemy machinery with abundant disinformation and then offer the poor misguided a providential exit." - pp 34-35
"The members of the original SD didn't even know they belonged to an organization with a strange name, and the officials who had authorized its existence didn't have the slightest idea that the operative unit they had approved was known by Alex as the Shit Department (SD)." - p 35
Now, if one were using the SD as a generalized example one might say "Take a Shit Department..".
"Fats had compiled more interesting material, which we could use to fill a good historical piece on the Revolution of the Carnations of April for which Madrid's Historia 16 had already offered by phone." - p 39
An interesting thing about reading multiple bks 'at the same time' (not actually simultaneously but alternating w/ each other) is the way synchronicities can occur. I wdn't've known what the Revolution of the Carnations of April meant if I hadn't just read about it in Scott MacDonald's Avant-Doc — specifically the interview w/ Portuguese moviemaker Susana de Sousa Dias.
"Susana de Sousa Diaz's experience of the fall of the Salazar regime in 1974 when she was 12 years old helped to create a fascination with the nature of the Portuguese experience during the decades before the Carnation Revolution freed the nation from forty-eight years of dictatorship." - p 266, Avant-Doc
"On December third of '75, Alex returned to New York from Lisbon on a Pan Am flight just hours before Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho and the military officers of COPCON, the extreme left of the Movimiento de la Fuerzas Armadas, had been arrested, accused of implication in the preparation of a military coup." - p 43
"Otelo Nuno Romão Saraiva de Carvalho, GCL (Portuguese pronunciation: [ɔˈtɛlu sɐˈɾajvɐ dɨ kɐɾˈvaʎu]; born 31 August 1936), is a retired Portuguese military officer. He was the chief strategist of the 1974 Carnation Revolution in Lisbon. After the Revolution, Otelo assumed leadership roles in the first Portuguese Provisional Governments, alongside Vasco Gonçalves and Francisco da Costa Gomes, and as the head of military defense force COPCON."
[..]
"On 25 November 1975, a military radical left-wing coup was attempted, made up of members of the MFA, the Portuguese Army Commandos, and COPCON under the leadership of Otelo. The coup, orchestrated by Otelo, failed to take control of the Portuguese government. As a result of the coup, Otelo was imprisoned, COPCON was disbanded, and António Ramalho Eanes rose to power. As punishment for participation in the coup, Otelo was imprisoned for three months." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otelo_S...
I've assumed that Alex & the SD were fictional characters used to explain US government dirty tricks. I looked superficially online to see if I cd find an "alex sd" but didn't. I then turned to a bk I have called Secret Police (1981) by Thomas Plate & Andrea Darvi. I found an "SD" based in Haiti & an "SDB" based in Yugoslavia but nothing for the US. Despite this, it seems relevant to quote the following:
"However, certain internal-security practices common to a SAVAK or a DINA have been adopted in the United States. Those aspects include extensive surveillance of political activity—in particular, although not exclusively, of the Left, and considerable counterintelligence penetration of left-wing groups, including the employment of agent-provocateur techniques.
"In order to achieve a high degree of political surveillance, the United States system of surveillance has operated in a highly decentralized, and to an important degree, unorganized fashion. This disorganization and decentralization derives from the complex political organization of the republic itself, as it operates on at least five levels: federal, state, county, city, and private corporate.
"The federal component of this sytem has included Army Intelligence; the CIA (which is prohibited in theory, but not in reality, from domestic spying); the FBI (practicing the classic variety of surveillance techniques, including surreptitious entry, penetration by informants, and electronic eavesdropping, as well as the usual agent-provocateur and disinformation measures); and the NSA (National Security Agency), with the technological ability to tap telephone conversations and other electronic communications. For a time, the federal Drug Enforcement Agency was a potentially active member of this system, but the Watergate revelations, which resulted in the resignation of President Nixon, curbed that development. At times, other agencies in the mammoth federal government have plugged into this informally organized intelligence system. For instance, in 1967, the Community Relations Service, in theory set up by the 1964 Civil Rights Act to mediate and conciliate racial disputes, was authorized to spy on militant black, antiwar, and radical protest groups."
- p 294, Secret Police — The Inside Story of a Network of Terror
Now, that bk was published in 1981 & Four Hands was copyrighted in 1990 so it's not too far-fetched to think that Taibo might've been influenced by this type of information in creating the Alex character & his SD. Now, imagine how much the US secret police state may've developed since then, since 9/11, & since the various horrible presidents (wch I include Obama in). I recently read Kim Stanley Robinson's Green Earth (2005/2015) in wch a character is surveilled by a US 'intelligence' organization similar to Taibo's SD in its slippery peripheralness. In the novel, Robinson presents the various groups that surreptitiously keep track of American citizens. Here's his list followed by an addition from this here reviewer:
""The Air Intelligence Agency. Army Intelligence and Security Command. Central Intelligence Agency. National Clandestine Service. Coast Guard Intelligence. Defense Intelligence Agency. Office of Intelligence, Department of Energy (really?). Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Department of State. Office of Intelligence Support, Department of the Treasury. National Security Division, Federal Bureau of Investigation. Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate. Marine Corps Intelligence Activity. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. National Intelligence Council. National Reconnaissance Office. National Security Agency. Office of Naval Intelligence. United States Secret Service.
""The Covert Action Staff. The Department of Homeland Security, Office of Intelligence and Analysis. The Directorate of Operations. Drug Enforcement Administration. Office of National Security Intelligence.
""The United States Intelligence Community (a cooperative federation).
FULL REVIEW: https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/...
Paco Ignacio Taibo II's Four Hands
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - September 15-19, 2019
FULL REVIEW: https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/...
I haven't gotten tired of praising Taibo yet. Reading his work is almost like reading the work of Philip K. Dick when I 1st started reading his work in 1984 & ended up reading almost a bk by him per wk for the entire yr — in other words, the Taibos are engrossing. I am immediately interested & I read them quickly. This particular Taibo bk is actually 'signed' — whether the signature is authentic or not I wdn't know but it's got 'PIRII/94" written on the title page.
Ya just never know what juicy thing Taibo'll dream up next. In this case, it's Stan Laurel wtinessing the assassination of a major Mexican revolutionary.
""They killed Pancho Villa!" he screamed.
"The scream broke Stan's trance and he managed to lift the gin to his lips. He emptied the bottle. It was 8:02 in the morning, July 20, 1923." - p 6
The inter-related narratives include an American named "Alex" who runs a branch of the secret police called the "SD". Their nefarious purpose being a particularly nasty mixture of assassination & disruption & character assassination thru disinformation. Taibo depicts him as diabolically conscience-free. An E. Howard Hunt sort, perhaps. I wonder if Taibo ever read any of Hunt's crime fiction novels?
"Alex is just inches from clinical paranoid schizophrenia. If the psychiatrist continues to question this diagnosis, Alex himself doesn't have a shadow of a doubt, he's completely convinced of his absolute insanity. But as long as they'll let him, he'll keep running the SD, owner and master, omnipotent czar, ruler of strange destinies. And it doesn't bother him to play God in an office that one enters through a hat boutique, a ladies' room, a cleaning closet, a service elevator, a fire escape stairwell, a window and the boss's desk. Actually, he loves it. This is his idea of heavenly bureaucracy." - p 12
Note that the translator, Laura C. Dail, writes " ladies' ", not adding an "s" after the apostrophe for the possessive of a word ending in "s", but writes " boss's ", adding an "s" after the apostrophe for the possessive of a word ending in "s". TAKE THAT, RULE-MONGERERS!! Otherwise note that this extreme villain is referred to by his 1st name, almost as if he's a personal friend, uncomfortably practically making him family despite the extremity of his socipathic behavior.
"On the night of the fifth or sixth of February, 1926, unknown intruders entered the Pantheon in Parral, profaning the tomb of the caudillo of the Agrarian Revolution of the North, slashed off the head of the cadaver and stole it. The affair caused rivers of ink to run in the North American press, since the United States continued to feed the myth of the fierce bandit who had dared in 1916 to attack the town of Columbus, in New Mexico, accomplishing the only foreign invasion in the history of modern North America. The Los Angeles papers devoted a large space to Villa and the pursuit of him. Mexican rumors rapidly crossed the border, placing the missing head one day in the hands of the widow of a rich rancher whom Villa had assassinated, another day a circus had it and was touring Texas exhibiting the remains, then it was in the hands of a group of fugitive lunatics from a mental asylum in Chihuahua, after that it was the illicit property of an Oklahoma spinster who had been in love with the Mexican military genius and who had commissioned a band of professional thieves from San Francisco to steal it." - p 15
Now, I shd point out that I deserve a fucking medal for quoting that last passage b/c I found Pancho Vila's head flattened like a flower between the pages where that passage appears & it was a mess, I'll tell you what!!. Maybe that's why Taibo signed this copy.
"Pancho Villa’s coffin had been dug up during the night and his body mutilated. Amparan was reluctant to report the desecration to the municipal authorities because Villa’s body had been decapitated and the head was missing." - https://www.theyucatantimes.com/2018/...
But what about John Dillinger's penis?
"One of the more bizarre celebrity legends is the claim that notorious bank robber John Dillinger was not only the proud possessor of an unusually large penis, but that this portion of his anatomy was removed post-mortem and put on display at one of the Smithsonian museums in Washington, D.C. (Some versions state that the receiving institution was not the Smithsonian but the Armed Forces Medical Museum, which is on the grounds of the Walter Reed Medical Center in Washington.) That the Smithsonian denies having (or ever having had) this piece of classic Americana in their collection is part of the game, of course. (An auxiliary portion of the legend is that Smithsonian docents, upon being asked where Mr. Dillinger’s organ can be found, will not deny its presence in the collection but will fabricate an excuse as to why it is not currently on display.)
"How and when this rumor got started is unknown. No documentary evidence indicates that Dillinger was renowned for either his sexual prowess or his possession of a prodigious member during his lifetime." - https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/pen...
You know the infamous SPK video where they show a corpse's head being held in a hand that's making it perform fellatio on a corpse's erect male member? Was that Pancho Villa & John Dillinger? Does the slang term "Deadhead" have anything to do w/ this?
"And to this astonishing information, one can add some of the legendary stories transmitted by the cultured natives in the Jesuit missions who say "the invisible people," "the big men" lived crazily following some insane reasoning, and practiced free sex in their ceremonies, later returning to normalcy, and they did not have chiefs, nor did they engage in war, nor did they have Gods or permanent homes (Cabrera, 147, 190-198, 212). - p 27
Wha?! Having just plopped that down in front of you w/o context it's only fair to add:
"Lydia Cabrera (May 20, 1899 in Havana, Cuba – September 19, 1991 in Miami, Florida) was a Cuban independent ethnographer.
"Cabrera was a Cuban writer and literary activist. She was an authority on Santería and other Afro-Cuban religions. During her lifetime she published over one hundred books; little of her work is available in English. Her most important book is El Monte (Spanish: "The Wilderness"), which was the first major ethnographic study of Afro-Cuban traditions, herbalism and religion. First published in 1954, the book became a "textbook" for those who practice Lukumi (orisha religion originating from the Yoruba and neighboring ethnic groups) and Palo Monte (a central African faith) both religions reaching the Caribbean through African slaves. Her papers and research materials were donated to the Cuban Heritage Collection - the largest repository of materials on or about Cuba located outside of Cuba - forming part of the library of the University of Miami. A section in Guillermo Cabrera Infante's book Tres Tigres Tristes is written under Lydia Cabrera's name, in a comical rendition of her literary voice. She was one of the first writers to recognize and sensitively publish on the richness of Afro-Cuban culture and religion. She made valuable contributions in the areas of literature, anthropology, art, ethnomusicology, and ethnology." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydia_C...
Cool, huh?! Aren't you glad I told you about her? Don't you want to just find & read one of her bks now ASAP?! But back to Alex & the SD:
"That's why Alex's idea was interesting. In the beginning it would be enough to saturate the enemy machinery with abundant disinformation and then offer the poor misguided a providential exit." - pp 34-35
"The members of the original SD didn't even know they belonged to an organization with a strange name, and the officials who had authorized its existence didn't have the slightest idea that the operative unit they had approved was known by Alex as the Shit Department (SD)." - p 35
Now, if one were using the SD as a generalized example one might say "Take a Shit Department..".
"Fats had compiled more interesting material, which we could use to fill a good historical piece on the Revolution of the Carnations of April for which Madrid's Historia 16 had already offered by phone." - p 39
An interesting thing about reading multiple bks 'at the same time' (not actually simultaneously but alternating w/ each other) is the way synchronicities can occur. I wdn't've known what the Revolution of the Carnations of April meant if I hadn't just read about it in Scott MacDonald's Avant-Doc — specifically the interview w/ Portuguese moviemaker Susana de Sousa Dias.
"Susana de Sousa Diaz's experience of the fall of the Salazar regime in 1974 when she was 12 years old helped to create a fascination with the nature of the Portuguese experience during the decades before the Carnation Revolution freed the nation from forty-eight years of dictatorship." - p 266, Avant-Doc
"On December third of '75, Alex returned to New York from Lisbon on a Pan Am flight just hours before Otelo Saraiva de Carvalho and the military officers of COPCON, the extreme left of the Movimiento de la Fuerzas Armadas, had been arrested, accused of implication in the preparation of a military coup." - p 43
"Otelo Nuno Romão Saraiva de Carvalho, GCL (Portuguese pronunciation: [ɔˈtɛlu sɐˈɾajvɐ dɨ kɐɾˈvaʎu]; born 31 August 1936), is a retired Portuguese military officer. He was the chief strategist of the 1974 Carnation Revolution in Lisbon. After the Revolution, Otelo assumed leadership roles in the first Portuguese Provisional Governments, alongside Vasco Gonçalves and Francisco da Costa Gomes, and as the head of military defense force COPCON."
[..]
"On 25 November 1975, a military radical left-wing coup was attempted, made up of members of the MFA, the Portuguese Army Commandos, and COPCON under the leadership of Otelo. The coup, orchestrated by Otelo, failed to take control of the Portuguese government. As a result of the coup, Otelo was imprisoned, COPCON was disbanded, and António Ramalho Eanes rose to power. As punishment for participation in the coup, Otelo was imprisoned for three months." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otelo_S...
I've assumed that Alex & the SD were fictional characters used to explain US government dirty tricks. I looked superficially online to see if I cd find an "alex sd" but didn't. I then turned to a bk I have called Secret Police (1981) by Thomas Plate & Andrea Darvi. I found an "SD" based in Haiti & an "SDB" based in Yugoslavia but nothing for the US. Despite this, it seems relevant to quote the following:
"However, certain internal-security practices common to a SAVAK or a DINA have been adopted in the United States. Those aspects include extensive surveillance of political activity—in particular, although not exclusively, of the Left, and considerable counterintelligence penetration of left-wing groups, including the employment of agent-provocateur techniques.
"In order to achieve a high degree of political surveillance, the United States system of surveillance has operated in a highly decentralized, and to an important degree, unorganized fashion. This disorganization and decentralization derives from the complex political organization of the republic itself, as it operates on at least five levels: federal, state, county, city, and private corporate.
"The federal component of this sytem has included Army Intelligence; the CIA (which is prohibited in theory, but not in reality, from domestic spying); the FBI (practicing the classic variety of surveillance techniques, including surreptitious entry, penetration by informants, and electronic eavesdropping, as well as the usual agent-provocateur and disinformation measures); and the NSA (National Security Agency), with the technological ability to tap telephone conversations and other electronic communications. For a time, the federal Drug Enforcement Agency was a potentially active member of this system, but the Watergate revelations, which resulted in the resignation of President Nixon, curbed that development. At times, other agencies in the mammoth federal government have plugged into this informally organized intelligence system. For instance, in 1967, the Community Relations Service, in theory set up by the 1964 Civil Rights Act to mediate and conciliate racial disputes, was authorized to spy on militant black, antiwar, and radical protest groups."
- p 294, Secret Police — The Inside Story of a Network of Terror
Now, that bk was published in 1981 & Four Hands was copyrighted in 1990 so it's not too far-fetched to think that Taibo might've been influenced by this type of information in creating the Alex character & his SD. Now, imagine how much the US secret police state may've developed since then, since 9/11, & since the various horrible presidents (wch I include Obama in). I recently read Kim Stanley Robinson's Green Earth (2005/2015) in wch a character is surveilled by a US 'intelligence' organization similar to Taibo's SD in its slippery peripheralness. In the novel, Robinson presents the various groups that surreptitiously keep track of American citizens. Here's his list followed by an addition from this here reviewer:
""The Air Intelligence Agency. Army Intelligence and Security Command. Central Intelligence Agency. National Clandestine Service. Coast Guard Intelligence. Defense Intelligence Agency. Office of Intelligence, Department of Energy (really?). Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Department of State. Office of Intelligence Support, Department of the Treasury. National Security Division, Federal Bureau of Investigation. Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate. Marine Corps Intelligence Activity. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. National Intelligence Council. National Reconnaissance Office. National Security Agency. Office of Naval Intelligence. United States Secret Service.
""The Covert Action Staff. The Department of Homeland Security, Office of Intelligence and Analysis. The Directorate of Operations. Drug Enforcement Administration. Office of National Security Intelligence.
""The United States Intelligence Community (a cooperative federation).
FULL REVIEW: https://www.goodreads.com/story/show/...
March 19, 2019
I'm a big fan of Taibo. Don't know anyone else who reads him but that probably says more about me than the author. Four hands is a wild ride that exhibits Taibo's cynicism about US political and clandestine meddling in Latin America. I like the relationship between the 2 journalists (the 4 hands) who anchor this book. The ride includes lots of side journeys (Leon Trotsky, Houdini, an aspiring doctoral students whose these are always rejected, etc. My favorite detour is to the storied pirate island fortress of Mompracem) The novel defies description. Don't read it if you like things to tie up neatly though there is something of a loose end gathering at the end.
March 27, 2008
this book is HELLA fun. bungling CIA agents are the bad guys (like in real life, right?). a pair of Mexican and American Jewish journalists, and a pair of old comrades- a Spanish anarchist and Ukranian (? i might be remembering wrong) communist- are the good guys.
throw in some references to Laurel and Hardy, a PhD student with outlandish dissertation topics, and a pirate story within the story, and you have a great book.
throw in some references to Laurel and Hardy, a PhD student with outlandish dissertation topics, and a pirate story within the story, and you have a great book.
October 8, 2010
Excellent read. As you are reading this, you find yourself wondering how on earth it all ties. together. This is well done, and ties together quite well, although I must admit I am tempted to put this on re-read list to see I I figured it out correctely.
Read
October 17, 2010Enjoyed the hell out of it. But have no desire to write about it.
February 13, 2022
Taibo's Four Hands is a wildly entertaining historical political thriller and satire liberally laced with humor which, in the telling with its multiple viewpoints and timeframes, reminds me somewhat of Catch-22 stylistically speaking, though the outrageousness of some of the satire and the way some of the characters are drawn also invoked Dr. Strangelove for me. From the LA Times review:
"The heroes of his tale, if we can single out only a couple of the memorable characters in “Four Hands,” are Greg Simon and Julio (Fats) Fernandez, an odd couple of international investigative journalism, whose first-person reminiscences are presented in alternating, almost Rashomon-style testimony that begins to reveal a labyrinthine plot of dazzling complexity....
"And the title of “Four Hands” refers to their intimate collaboration at the typewriter keyboard where they compose the stories that ultimately draw them into an intimate dance with spies, hit men, terrorists, drug dealers and assorted other malefactors in a complex fugue of crime, obsession and violence....
But Greg and Julio are only two of the men and women who flash in and out of view like figures in a hall of mirrors. There’s Alex, the merry prankster who doubles as a spymaster in deep cover. Rolando is a drug trafficker “on (his) way to becoming one of Mexico’s blackest legends.” Stoyan Vasilev is a profoundly enigmatic 82-year-old Bulgarian counter-spy who haunts (and is haunted by) a half-century of history and politics.
And, intriguingly, Taibo drafts various historical figures into service as characters in “Four Hands"--Stan Laurel, Leon Trotsky, Pancho Villa, Harry Houdini--and they take on new and beguiling dimensions as Taibo inserts them in the phantasmagoria of his narrative. Indeed, Houdini’s imagined confessions to his psychoanalyst are as poignant, and as plausible, as any of the historical asides that decorate Taibo’s book....
The fever dream that is Taibo’s novel reaches a crescendo when the various conspirators, who have been just missing each other for 300 pages or so, finally collide in a hotel corridor in Mexico City, a conflagration that features an antique Colt six-shooter and “the first recorded Tequila Molotov.”
“It’s quite unreal, quite absurd,” says one of Alex’s operatives when the smoke finally clears, “it’s like a Spielberg movie."
And that accurately describes Taibo's surreal sendup of American imperialism, with all its dirty tricks and political Intrigues. Highly recommended and 4 stars.
"The heroes of his tale, if we can single out only a couple of the memorable characters in “Four Hands,” are Greg Simon and Julio (Fats) Fernandez, an odd couple of international investigative journalism, whose first-person reminiscences are presented in alternating, almost Rashomon-style testimony that begins to reveal a labyrinthine plot of dazzling complexity....
"And the title of “Four Hands” refers to their intimate collaboration at the typewriter keyboard where they compose the stories that ultimately draw them into an intimate dance with spies, hit men, terrorists, drug dealers and assorted other malefactors in a complex fugue of crime, obsession and violence....
But Greg and Julio are only two of the men and women who flash in and out of view like figures in a hall of mirrors. There’s Alex, the merry prankster who doubles as a spymaster in deep cover. Rolando is a drug trafficker “on (his) way to becoming one of Mexico’s blackest legends.” Stoyan Vasilev is a profoundly enigmatic 82-year-old Bulgarian counter-spy who haunts (and is haunted by) a half-century of history and politics.
And, intriguingly, Taibo drafts various historical figures into service as characters in “Four Hands"--Stan Laurel, Leon Trotsky, Pancho Villa, Harry Houdini--and they take on new and beguiling dimensions as Taibo inserts them in the phantasmagoria of his narrative. Indeed, Houdini’s imagined confessions to his psychoanalyst are as poignant, and as plausible, as any of the historical asides that decorate Taibo’s book....
The fever dream that is Taibo’s novel reaches a crescendo when the various conspirators, who have been just missing each other for 300 pages or so, finally collide in a hotel corridor in Mexico City, a conflagration that features an antique Colt six-shooter and “the first recorded Tequila Molotov.”
“It’s quite unreal, quite absurd,” says one of Alex’s operatives when the smoke finally clears, “it’s like a Spielberg movie."
And that accurately describes Taibo's surreal sendup of American imperialism, with all its dirty tricks and political Intrigues. Highly recommended and 4 stars.
January 9, 2012
THIS is fantastic crime/espionage novel... even if you need a degree in central american revolutionary history to truly follow. Taibo II is so intelligent it hurts and the dexterity with which he ties together disparate arcs is a wonder to behold. Four Hands is a bit of a patchwork, and with the abundance of characters and histories it can be daunting, but I quickly became addicted to each of the story lines and found them all rewarding threads in and of themselves. But in that sense I almost had to read it as a collection of interlocking short stories, and this may be the only reason I couldn't give it the 5 stars. Maybe I'm just not mentally agile enough...
September 1, 2015
Πραγματικά περίπλοκο. Αδυνατούσα να συλλάβω πως όλοι αυτοί οι ήρωες θα δέσουν, θα γίνουν συστατικά της ίδιας συνταγής. Και όμως, έγινε! Από τα μυθιστορήματα που σε κάνουν να αναρωτιέσαι ποιο μυαλό μπορεί να συλλάβει τέτοια πολυπλοκότητα (και στον αντίποδα γιατί το δικό σου μπορεί τυχόν να πλάσει μόλις κάτι στοιχειώδες…) και να την ολοκληρώσει/ παρουσιάσει χωρίς κενά.
Αξίζει να το διαβάσει κανείς, για να «μπει» και στο (νέο) Λατινοαμερικάνικο αστυνομικό μυθιστόρημα και να αναγνωρίσει τις μεγάλες διαφορές και από το βορειο ευρωπαικό (Σκανδιναβία), αλλά και από το μεσογειακό (Ισπανία, Ιταλία, Ελλάδα).
Αξίζει να το διαβάσει κανείς, για να «μπει» και στο (νέο) Λατινοαμερικάνικο αστυνομικό μυθιστόρημα και να αναγνωρίσει τις μεγάλες διαφορές και από το βορειο ευρωπαικό (Σκανδιναβία), αλλά και από το μεσογειακό (Ισπανία, Ιταλία, Ελλάδα).
March 2, 2016
"Llevando ya varios libros del autor puedo afirmar que esta novela se aleja mucho de lo que nos tiene acostumbrados. Lo que llevaría a muchos a tomar distancia. Y sí, puedo secundar esa acción. No es un libro complicado pero tampoco es tan sencillo como las decenas que le preceden. No es difícil de leer pero sí de ver en un contexto general y poder definir el camino a seguir. Los personajes son geniales y te encariñas fácilmente, pero de la misma manera te pierdes y cuesta engancharlos unos a otros."
Reseña completa en: http://contraelpromediomexicano.com/2...
Reseña completa en: http://contraelpromediomexicano.com/2...
December 18, 2014
A very innovative and clever setting for a novel though I find it hard to follow all the information given and I found,many times, myself lost in the traces of narration after one day of reading pause. I have enriched my knowledge on Latin America politics through personal research insprired by the novel.
May 8, 2009
possibly one of the best books I've read
April 5, 2023
A fan of Taibo and his work. Especially his work now as the head of the Mexico’s national book publisher. This book was a bit of a challenge. So many nuggets throughout that will want you to google search every detail to see what’s real and what’s fiction (the answer is obviously somewhere in the middle). I feel like I need to go back and reread, or at the very least, reread key points so that I remember how all of the many plots come together. Taibo, at the end of it all, is a master of bringing together history, humor, and intrigue in one book. If you’re a more diligent, faster reader, and a reader with better memory than I am, you will certainly have a better chance of keeping up with various plots or others have described it as, “articles” of the book.
June 5, 2024
cap 122. De todos los monstruos que viajan hacia el sur, nosotros somos los más peligrosos, porque creemos que no tenemos pecado original que tenha que ser perdonado.
Además de ser un libro referencialmente denso, esta escrito en mexicano puro, de esos que oirlos uno se siente en casa y es una increiblemente bien entre-tejida história de la profesión periodística: las ideologías genealógicas que las instigan y las múltiples histórias individuales que se desenvuelven a lo largo del tiempo para colmatar en un cruce de caminos que crea un momento. Y los límites del entendimiento humano, la ignorancia de las causas a las que estamos condenados por nuestas facultades y inomnipotencia humana.
...porque al fin y al cabo, los periodistas no creen en coincidencias.
Además de ser un libro referencialmente denso, esta escrito en mexicano puro, de esos que oirlos uno se siente en casa y es una increiblemente bien entre-tejida história de la profesión periodística: las ideologías genealógicas que las instigan y las múltiples histórias individuales que se desenvuelven a lo largo del tiempo para colmatar en un cruce de caminos que crea un momento. Y los límites del entendimiento humano, la ignorancia de las causas a las que estamos condenados por nuestas facultades y inomnipotencia humana.
...porque al fin y al cabo, los periodistas no creen en coincidencias.
February 19, 2025
Avevo tentato anni di approcciarmi a Taibo II con "La bicicletta di Leonardo", che ha una struttura simile di narrazioni interconnesse e che però non mi aveva appassionato troppo (e infatti avevo abbandonato). Qua invece la narrazione scorre molto veloce e il libro mi ha preso fin da subito con il suo misto di avventura, satira (politica e non) e storia.
June 13, 2025
Sin duda alguna es una obra maestra en cuanto a construcción narrativa se refiere, lamentablemente no es mi estilo de libros y me costó bastante poder seguir el hilo.
Demasiadas historias, demasiados personajes, mucha información que recordar, otra tanta que no considere relevante y que solo me distraía.
Creo que es un gran libro pero no es para todo el mundo
Demasiadas historias, demasiados personajes, mucha información que recordar, otra tanta que no considere relevante y que solo me distraía.
Creo que es un gran libro pero no es para todo el mundo
February 6, 2025
A deconstruction of the spy thriller. Information. Disinformation. Reporters. Spys. Chaos starting with Stan Laurel and Pancho Villa and ending in the confused final act of the Cold War. Lots of mayhem in the world before the world we live in formed. Just how did we get here?
August 24, 2022
I did not get much from this one
February 20, 2014
I was given this novel by a fan of Taibo’s oeuvre, and I wanted to thank his generosity by doing the novel justice, reading carefully and attentively. Unfortunately, I was in the midst of personal chaos (making a permanent move from one continent to another), and I jerkily proceeded in fits and starts through the novel over the course of four days, never being able to read for longer than 30 minutes. This created something of mental strobe effect, a disjointed perception of what appears to be happening. Combine this strobe effect with the author’s intentional fragmenting of a multi-threaded story, and it’s probably safe to say I didn’t get as much from my reading as I’d have wished. That said, I enjoyed the story, especially upon reflection.
The story is largely about a present day (the novel was published in 1990) CIA plot to weaken external support for and cause internal strife within the Sandinista movement in South America, but behind this is another story of two old-time revolutionaries whose stories begin with the Spanish Civil War and continue through conflicts during and after WWII, in Europe and in South America. And, amongst many other additional threads, there are seemingly irrelevant events involving Stan Laurel and Houdini.
The “four hands” of the novel’s title refer to the writing method of two globe-hopping journalists, one American and the other Spanish-Mexican, who compose their stories in both English and Spanish, then spawn variants suitable to one or another market (eg, Europe, US, Latin America). These two tell their part of the story, with their chapters alternating first-person narrators. Their part in the grander scheme is to serve as the CIA mastermind’s newsbreaking source of the scandal of the Sandinista general’s connections with international drug operations.
The other principal perspective in the novel is the CIA mastermind, Alex, a hair’s breadth away from a psychotic break, whose chapters develop the means and illustrate the mechanisms by which the plot is staged and enacted. His principle belief is that there is no coincidence, that all events can be controlled. Ha! Coincidence does in fact exist, and it is ironic, as the revolutionary general he means to bring down is ultimately saved by the actions of the two old-time revolutionaries who recognize malfeasance when they see it, even if they don’t know the particulars.
More than the unraveling of an elaborate plan to deceive and destroy, this is the story of a prevailing spirit of rebellion against injustice. Much of the pleasure in reading this book is trying to see the forest when in front of you at any given moment Taibo has planted a yet another tree with its own rich, distinct, concealing foliage.
The story is largely about a present day (the novel was published in 1990) CIA plot to weaken external support for and cause internal strife within the Sandinista movement in South America, but behind this is another story of two old-time revolutionaries whose stories begin with the Spanish Civil War and continue through conflicts during and after WWII, in Europe and in South America. And, amongst many other additional threads, there are seemingly irrelevant events involving Stan Laurel and Houdini.
The “four hands” of the novel’s title refer to the writing method of two globe-hopping journalists, one American and the other Spanish-Mexican, who compose their stories in both English and Spanish, then spawn variants suitable to one or another market (eg, Europe, US, Latin America). These two tell their part of the story, with their chapters alternating first-person narrators. Their part in the grander scheme is to serve as the CIA mastermind’s newsbreaking source of the scandal of the Sandinista general’s connections with international drug operations.
The other principal perspective in the novel is the CIA mastermind, Alex, a hair’s breadth away from a psychotic break, whose chapters develop the means and illustrate the mechanisms by which the plot is staged and enacted. His principle belief is that there is no coincidence, that all events can be controlled. Ha! Coincidence does in fact exist, and it is ironic, as the revolutionary general he means to bring down is ultimately saved by the actions of the two old-time revolutionaries who recognize malfeasance when they see it, even if they don’t know the particulars.
More than the unraveling of an elaborate plan to deceive and destroy, this is the story of a prevailing spirit of rebellion against injustice. Much of the pleasure in reading this book is trying to see the forest when in front of you at any given moment Taibo has planted a yet another tree with its own rich, distinct, concealing foliage.
May 26, 2013
I 'm not really a fan of detective or crime novels. Although when it happens to read these kind of books I have this problem. I like almost most of them, just a few seem uninteresting to me, and less make me love them. Unfortunately this one was one of them which didn't manage to impress me. I had this book many days next to my bed, and when I was taking it to my hands for reading it was very easy for me to put it down after a few pages or paragraphs. It's not a really easy reading I think, and if I could give an advice to someone who wants to read it, that would be to do it in a fast pace. And this because it's a bit complicated, the plot moves back and forth, and the characters are so many so if you want to follow the plot you must be focused. Didn't really liked it and finished it more because I didn't want to leave it unread.
May 9, 2014
Another book that requires close attention, as the rather short chapters change viewpoint frequently, but this layered novel by one of Mexico's premier novelists is worth it.
It starts with Stan Laurel observing the assassination of Pancho Villa in 1923, and gets stranger.
It starts with Stan Laurel observing the assassination of Pancho Villa in 1923, and gets stranger.
September 14, 2016
Maestro de maestros. Estilo envidiable y disfrutabilísimo. Una parte lo leí en un jacuzzi en una terraza en Vernon (silver star) con una Kokanee en la mano después de la carrera ciclista 24 horas de adrenalina.
February 19, 2007
my smart friend josh macphee told me to read this- thanks josh. if you find conspiracies interesting, read this.
September 13, 2007
Just couldn't get into it.
November 21, 2009
I love his detective novels, but this book bored me to the point that I stopped reading.
April 28, 2010
i forget what number taibo ii book this is for me. file under meta-speculative-historical-dectective novel.
January 8, 2014
For Taibo's lovers only: a bit confusing plot, needs to focus on to get it right. On the other hand, it is to brilliantly written, that everything falls into place, in the end.
July 20, 2015
Me gustaría que usted lo viera así. La mente es una cárcel, la sociedad frecuentemente es una estructura carcelaria y usted ha propuesto la fuga universal. (Lucius Kellerman) p. 290
June 10, 2018
Inteligente, delirante y divertida novela.
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