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A Long Petal of the Sea

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by Isabel Allende

Overview:

This is the first of the three books I'm calling the "Refugee Trilogy" (alongside The Beekeeper of Aleppo and The Island of Missing Trees) that I read this summer. I've always felt something of a connection to stories about people being somewhat of vagabonds and lacking a homeland so this set of books was very enjoyable. Specifically about A Long Petal of the Sea, it's definitely the weakest of the three. Which is more of a testament to how good the other books in my little "trilogy" were than to problems with this book.

So, A Long Petal of the Sea. This books tells the story about refugees from the Spanish Civil War who settle in Chile and rebuild their lives. The book starts off with a gripping and intense introduction and ends with an intensely emotional and poignant conclusion. The emotions especially at the end of the book are very powerful and it is overall a very good book.

But, if you read the first sentence of that paragraph and thought, "It sounds like there might be a lot of history and politics in the book," you'd be right. And, unfortunately, it does get a bit bogged down in the politics and history in the middle. At times it feels like you're just being told about events happening and like those events aren't necessary to the overall meaning or plot of the book at all. In fact, probably most of the middle fifth or so of the book feels like that. There are even a couple points where it feels like the characters just become a lot more distant and sterile, which detracts from the story the book is trying to tell. However, the ending does speed up again and does recapture and then exceed the intensity of the opening on a powerful emotional level. You feel for the characters especially at the first third and the last quarter of the novel and it's a great window into the tragedy that is war, the grief that is losing your homeland, and the connections to other people that really let you move on and grown. This book shows the pain of loss and the healing power of family and friends and love.

Overall, enjoyable read and poignant look into the lives of those who have lost their homeland. Just, could've used some better pacing and storytelling. Solid 7/10.