Rudolfo Anaya - Bless Me, Ultima

I've been reading a lot of foreign books lately. Rudolfo Anaya's acclaimed book Bless Me, Ultima, culturally replete and unapologetically rambling, reminds me of a long story told by one's grandparent or older relative. You may be interested in the beginning, and even at intervals throughout, but the book, like the stories it recalls, failed to hold my attention.

Bless Me, Ultima is the story of Antonio's loss of innocence over the course of roughly two years - he witnesses murder and the magic of the curandera while trying to determine his path in life: priest or farmer. Ultima, the title character, is an old curandera who helps shape Antonio's life. In keeping with the movement of magical realism, particularly as it has been seen in Latin American literature, Antonio witnesses both the magical power of good and evil, and must choose between them. For all that magical realism sounds exciting, it really involves nothing more titillating than what you'd see if you bothered to re-watch The Crucible.

For all that Anaya's prose conjures the restless winds of the llano and the peaceful land of the Lunas, his story reads like the dullest of memoirs. Antonio relates everyday details at great length, dwelling on minutiae to the point that the reader has no sense of the narrative thrust of the novel. All of Antonio's struggles to stay faithful, innocent, and good lead us nowhere but to muddled emotions and the sense that the novel has been left unfinished.

I say more magic might help.