Argentina is a rather large country in South America. You may remember it from the musical/movie Evita (which I actually haven't seen, but know almost the entire soundtrack to...it's on my list to watch.)
So here's the lowdown on the book:
Told from the perspective of an adolescent girl, this humorous and deceptively intuitive account of a Jewish family living in 1940s Buenos Aires tackles themes of identity and history through a flawlessly rendered colloquial style. Semi-autobiographical and charged with energy to match the young narrator's age, this episodic novel tackles issues of religious belonging, the first sparks of political awareness, budding sexuality, and the complications of an eccentric family.
I know for the previous "reviews" I've made bullet points, but I'm not doing that for this one. There weren't a lot of specific areas that caught my attention, and I think it would just be easier to give an overall.
One thing that did stand out was the mention of the pogrom, the massacre of Jews in Russia. There have been so many Jewish massacres throughout history. It's kind of insane.
Anyway another big theme that jumped out in this book was kind of crappy family. The women in this family seemed to completely hate and resent each other and do nothing but fight. It was honestly kind of depressing.
The account of the childhood was a little disjointed for my liking; the stories didn't transition or connect very well. It was entertaining enough, but I didn't really see much of the humor and energy in the description.
Toward the end of the book it gets a little political. It talks about Peron being elected and how most of the people that she knew didn't support him. It kind of spurred me to read a bit about him, and I'm confused. Ok, I haven't quite finished my "research," but so far it sounds like he did a lot of good for Argentina. There also aren't dates attached to the Peron stories in the book, so that makes it a bit harder to relate the two.
Alright, so this book wasn't quite as entertaining or telling as I'd hoped. But my final thought is that it got me interested in learning some different parts of world history, so I'll call that good.
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